m-     -THE- 

'  IMPREGNABLE 
•ROCK- 
•  OF*     '* 
\         -HOLY- 
SCRIPTVRE 


THERIGHTH0N\«!ZVIEGLADST0NE!51P- 


/2..  f .  zz. 


BS  540  .G55  1891 
Gladstone,  W.  E.  1809-1898 
The  impregnable  rock  of  Holi 
Scripture 


^tt\mnt\}th  h^  Ijim  to 
Prtnrrtntt  QIIjMlngtral  g^^mtttarg 


THE 

IMPREGNABLE  ROCK  OF  HOLY  SCRIPTURE 


THE 

IMPREGNABLE  ROCK  OF  HOLY 
SCRIPTURE 


BY 

The  Rt.  Hon.  W.  E.'gLADSTONE,  M.  P. 


REVISED  AND  ENLARGED 
From   THE  SUNDAY   SCHOOL  TIMES 


PHILADELPHIA 

JOHN  D.  WATTLES,  Publisher 

i8qi 


Copyright,  1890, 

by 

JOHN  D.  WATTLES. 


PREFATORY  NOTE. 


The  additions,  which  in  the  course  of  revision 
have  been  made  to  these  Essays,  are  in  the  nature 
of  amplified  or  newly  supplied  argument,  and  do 
not  affect  their  general  tenor. 

In  the  Jewish  Chronicle  of  September  12,  1890, 
I  find  a  paragraph  which  appears  to  approve  the 
general  argument  of  my  article  on  "  The  Mosaic 
Legislation,"  but  impugns  the  statement  that  the 
Massorites  were  a  body  without  a  parallel  in  his- 
tory, and  that  the  Hebrews  were  alone  in  building 
up  a  regularly  scientific  method  of  handling  the 
material  forms  of  their  sacred  oracles.  I  have  not 
the  slightest  pretension  to  speak  with  authority 
upon  this  subject,  and  I  did  no  more  than  endeavor 
to  report  faithfully  what  I  gathered  from  trust- 
worthy sources.     But  I  have  no  reason  to  believe 


PREFACE. 

that  my  readers  have  been  misled.  As  regards 
the  Hindus,  I  understand  it  is  stated  that  they 
counted  verses,  words,  syllables,  and  letters ;  but 
it  does  not  appear  that  this  statement  is  one  his- 
torically authenticated.  Even  if  it  were  so,  and  if 
we  add  that  the  Samaritans  imitated  the  proceed- 
ings of  their  Jewish  brethren,  and  that  similar 
enumeration  was  made  by  Syrians  or  others,  yet 
the  answer  remains  that  such  a  computation  is  a 
very  small  component  part  of  the  Massorah,  and 
can  no  more  be  called  an  equivalent  to  it  than  a 
human  limb  can  be  called  a  human  body.  To  the 
Massorah,  so  far  as  I  can  learn,  there  is  nothing  ap- 
proaching an  equivalent.  As  respects  the  Greeks, 
they  had  no  sacred  writings  at  all;  and  I  am 
unaware  of  their  having  used,  in  any  case,  any 
such  method  as  is  here  in  question. 


Hawarden  Castle, 

November,  i8go. 


CONTENTS. 


I.  PAGB 

First  View  of  the  Impregnable  Rock  of  Holy  Scripture      i 

II. 

The  Creation  Story 34 

III. 

The  Office  and  Work  of  the  Old  Testament  in  Outline    97 

IV. 
The  Psalms     .     . .    148 

V. 

The  Mosaic  Legislation 201 

VI. 

On  the  Recent  Corroborations  of  Scripture  from  the 
Regions  of  History  and  Natural  Science     .     .     .257 

VII. 
Conclusion 30a 


FIRST   VIEW  OF  THE  IMPREGNABLE 
ROCK  OF  HOLY  SCRIPTURE. 


It  is  a  serious  question  how  far  one  ignorant, 
like  myself,  of  Hebrew,  and  having  no  regular  prac- 
tice in  the  study  and  explanation  of  the  text  of  the 
Old  Testament,  is  entitled  to  attempt  representa- 
tions concerning  it,  which  must  present  more  or 
less  the  character  of  advice,  to  any  portion  of  his 
fellow-men.  It  is  clear  that  he  can  draw  no  suf- 
ficient warrant  for  such  a  course  from  the  mere 
warmth  of  his  desire  to  arrest  a  prevailing  mischief, 
or  from  his  fear  lest  any  portion  of  the  English- 
speaking  public  should  lose  or  relax  unawares  their 
hold  upon  the  Book  which  Christendom  regards 
as  an  inestimable  treasure,  and  thereby  bring  upon 
themselves,  as  well  as  others,  an  inexpressible 
calamity.     But,  on  the  other  hand,  he  has  some 


2  THE  IMPREGNABLE  ROCK 

better  pleas  to  urge.  The  first  is,  that  there  is  a 
very  large  section  of  the  community  whose  oppor- 
tunities of  judgment  have  been  materially  smaller 
than  his  own.  The  second  is,  that  though  he  is 
greatly  wanting  in  the  valuable  qualifications  which 
grow  out  of  special  study  in  this  field,  he  has,  for 
more  than  forty  years  (believing  that  change  of 
labor  is  to  a  great  extent  the  healthiest  form  of 
recreation),  devoted  the  larger  part  of  all  such  time 
as  he  could  properly  withdraw  from  political  duties 
to  another,  and  in  several  respects  a  similar,  field 
of  specialism;  namely,  the  earnest  study  of  pre- 
historic antiquity  and  of  its  documents  in  regard 
to  the  Greek  race,  whose  destinies  have  been,  after 
those  of  the  Hebrews,  the  most  wonderful  in  them- 
selves, and  the  most  fertile  of  results  for  us,  among 
all  the  races  of  mankind.  As  between  this  field, 
which  has  for  its  central  point  the  study  of  Homer, 
and  that  of  the  early  Scriptures,  which  may  in  the 
mass  be  roughly  called  contemporary  with  the 
Homeric  period,  much  light  is,  and  with  the  prog- 
ress of  research  more  can  hardly  fail  to  be,  given 


OF  HOL  V  SCRIPTURE,  3 

and  received.  Moreover,  I  have  there  had  the 
opportunity  of  perceiving  how,  among  specialists 
as  with  other  men,  there  may  be  fashions  of  the 
time  and  school,  which  Lord  Bacon  called  idols  of 
the  market-place,  and  currents  of  prejudice  below 
the  surface,  such  as  to  detract  somewhat  from  the 
authority  which  each  inquirer  might  justly  claim  in 
his  own  field,  and  from  their  title  to  impose  their 
conclusions  upon  mankind.  As  a  judicious  artist 
likes  to  know  the  opinion  even  of  one  not  an  expert 
on  his  picture,  and  sometimes  derives  benefit  from 
it,  so  in  all  studies  lights  may  be  thrown  inwards 
from  without;  and  this  in  far  the  largest  degree 
where  the  special  branch  deals  with  a  subject-matter 
that  both  takes  deep  root  in  our  nature,  and  is  the 
source  of  profoundly  interesting  controversies  for 
mankind  at  large.  Yet  I  do  not  feel  sure  that  these 
considerations  would  have  led  me  to  make  the 
present  attempt,  were  they  not  capped  with  another 
of  great  importance.  It  appears  to  me  that  we 
may  grant,  for  argument's  sake,  to  the  negative  or 
destructive   specialist  in  the  field  of  the   ancient 


4  THE  IMPREGNABLE  ROCK 

Scriptures,  all  which  as  a  specialist  he  can  by  pos- 
sibility be  entitled  to  ask  respecting  the  age,  text, 
and  authorship  of  the  books,  and  yet  may  hold 
firmly,  as  firmly  as  of  old,  to  the  ideas  justly  con- 
veyed by  the  title  I  have  adopted  for  these  papers, 
and  may  invite  our  fellow-men  to  stand  along  with 
us  on  "  the  impregnable  rock  of  Holy  Scripture." 

These  words  sound  like  a  challenge.  And  they 
are  a  challenge  to  some  extent,  but  not  in  the  sense 
that  might  be  supposed.  They  are  a  challenge  to 
accept  the  Scriptures  on  the  moral  and  spiritual 
and  historical  ground  of  their  character  in  them- 
selves, and  of  the  work  which  they,  and  the  agencies 
associated  with  them,  have  done  in  the  world  for 
some  thousands  of  years,  and  are  doing  still.  We 
may,  without  touching  the  domain  of  the  critic, 
contend  for  them  as  corresponding  by  their  con- 
tents to  the  idea  of  a  Divine  revelation  to  man. 
We  are  entitled  to  attempt  to  show  that  they 
afford  that  kind  of  proof  of  such  a  revelation  which 
is  analogous  to  the  known  divine  operations  in  other 
spheres,  which  binds  us  as  to  conduct;  and  which 


OF  HOL  V  SCRIPTl  'RE.  5 

in  other  matters,  from  the  simple  fact  that  we  are 
rational  beings,  we  recognize  as  entitled  so  to  bind 
us.  And  again,  we  may  legitimately  ask  whether 
they  do  not  differ  in  such  a  manner  from  the  other 
documents  of  historic  and  prehistoric  religions, 
while  these  too  are  precious  in  various  ways,  as  to 
make  them  witnesses  and  buttresses  to  the  office 
of  Holy  Scripture  rather  than  sharers  in  it,  al- 
though in  their  degree  they  may  be  this  also. 

But  all  these  assertions  lie  within  the  moral  and 
spiritual  precinct.  No  one  of  them  begs  any  liter- 
ary question  of  Old  Testament  criticism.  They 
leave  absolutely  open  every  issue  that  has  been  or 
can  be  raised  respecting  the  origin,  date,  author- 
ship and  text  of  the  sacred  books,  which  for  the 
present  purpose  we  do  not  require  even  to  call 
sacred.  Indeed,  it  may  be  that  this  destructive 
criticism,  if  entirely  made  good,  would,  in  the  view 
of  an  inquiry  really  searching,  comprehensive,  and 
philosophical,  leave  as  its  result  not  less  but  greater 
reason  for  admiring  the  hidden  modes  by  which 
the  great  Artificer  works  out  his  designs.     For,  in 


6  THE  IMPREGNABLE  ROCK 

proportion  as  the  means  are  feeble,  perplexed,  and 
to  all  appearance  confused,  is  the  marvel  of  the 
results  that  are  made  to  stand  before  our  eyes. 
And  the  upshot  may  come  to  be,  that,  on  this  very 
ground,  we  may  have  to  cry  out  with  the  Psalmist 
(Psa.  107  :  8)  absorbed  in  worshiping  admiration, 
"  Oh,  that  men  would  therefore  praise  the  Lord  for 
his  goodness,  and  declare  the  wonders  that  he  doeth 
for  the  children  of  men ! "  For,  "  How  unsearchable 
are  his  judgments,  and  his  ways  past  finding  out." 
For  the  memories  of  men,  and  the  art  of  writing, 
and  the  care  of  the  copyist,  and  the  tablet  and 
the  rolls  of  parchment,  are  but  the  secondary  or 
mechanical  means  by  which  the  Word  has  been 
carried  down  to  us  along  the  river  of  the  ages ; 
and  the  natural  and  inherent  weakness  of  these 
means  is  but  a  special  tribute  to  the  grandeur  and 
vastness  of  the  end,  and  of  Him  that  wrought 
it  out. 

So,  then,  these  high-sounding  words  have  been 
placed  in  the  foreground  of  the  present  observa- 
tions, because  they  convey  in  a -positive  and  definite 


OF  HOL  V  SCRIPTURE.  7 

manner  the  conclusion  which  the  observations 
themselves  aim  at  sustaining,  at  least  in  outline, 
on  general  grounds  of  reason,  and  at  enforcing  as  a 
commanding  rule  of  thought  and  life.  They  lead 
upwards  and  onwards  to  the  idea  that  the  Scriptures 
are  well  called  Holy  Scriptures;  and  that,  though 
assailed  by  camp,  by  batter}^,  and  by  mine,  they 
are  nevertheless  a  house  builded  upon  a  rock,  and 
that  rock  impregnable;  that  the  weapon  of  offense, 
which  shall  impair  their  efficiency  for  aiding  in  the 
redemption  of  mankind,  has  not  yet  been  forged; 
that  the  Sacred  Canon,  which  it  took  (perhaps)  two 
thousand  years  from  the  accumulations  of  Moses 
down  to  the  acceptance  of  the  Apocalypse  to  con- 
struct, is  like  to  wear  out  the  storms  and  the  sun- 
shine of  the  world,  and  all  the  wayward  aberrations 
of  humanity,  not  merely  for  a  term  as  long,  but 
until  time  shall  be  no  more. 

And  yet,  upon  the  very  threshold,  I  embrace, 
in  what  I  think  a  substantial  sense,  one  of  the 
great  canons  of  modern  criticism,  which  teaches 
us  that  the  Scriptures  are  to  be  treated  like  any 


8  THE  IMPREGNABLE  ROCK 

other  book  in  the  trial  of  their  title.  The  volume 
which  is  put  into  our  hands  when  young  under 
that  venerated  name,  is,  like  any  other  volume, 
made  with  paper,  types,  and  ink,  and  has  been  put 
together  as  a  material  object  by  human  hands. 
The  many  and  diversified  utterances  it  contains 
proceeded  from  the  mouth  or  pen  of  men;  and 
the  question,  whether  and  in  what  degree,  through 
supernatural  guidance,  they  were,  for  this  pur- 
pose, more  than  men,  is  to  be  determined,  like 
other  disputable  questions,  by  the  evidence.  The 
books  have  been  transmitted  to  us  from  their 
formation  onwards  in  perishable  materials,  and 
from  remote  dates.  They  were  so  transmitted, 
until  four  hundred  years  ago,  by  the  agency  of 
copyists,  as  in  the  case  of  other  literary  produc- 
tions, and  presumably  with  a  like  liability  to  casual 
error  or  to  fraudulent  handling.  That  in  some 
sense  the  Holy  Scriptures  contain  something  of  a 
human  element  is  clear,  as  to  the  New  Testament, 
from  diversities  of  reading,  from  slight  conflicts  in 
the  narrative,  and  from  an  insignificant  number  of 


OF  HOL  V  SCRIPTURE.  9 

controverted  cases  as  to  the  authenticity  of  the  text. 
We  have  also  the  Latin  Vulgate  partially  com- 
peting with  the  Greek  original  on  the  ground  that 
it  has  been  more  or  less  founded  on  manuscripts 
older  than  any  we  now  possess.  As  regards  the 
Old  Testament,  we  find  the  established  Hebrew 
text  to  be  founded  on  manuscripts  of  a  date  not 
earlier  than,  I  believe,  the  tenth  century  of  our  era. 
It  is,  moreover,  at  variance  in  many  points  with 
the  Greek  version,  commonly  termed  the  Septu- 
agint,  which  is  considered  to  date  wholly,  or  in  the 
main,  from  the  third  century  before  the  Advent  of 
our  Saviour  and  the  framers  of  which  had  before 
them  copies  older  by  more  than  a  thousand  years. 
Thus  the  accuracy  of  the  text,  the  age  and  author- 
ship of  the  books,  open  up  a  vast  field  of  purely  lit- 
erary controversy;  and  such  a  question  as  whether 
the  closing  verses  of  St.  Mark's  Gospel  ^  have  the 
authority  of  Scripture  must  be  determined  by  lit- 

1  I  have  never  seen  a  confutation  of  the  reasonings  of  Dean  Burgon 
in  his  treatise  on  this  subject.  He  supports  the  text  as  it  stands. 
The  marginal  note  in  the  Revised  Version  is  surely  unsatisfactory,  for 
it  does  not  tell  the  whole  case,  but  only  a  part,  about  the  manuscripts. 


lO  THE  IMPREGNABLE  ROCK 

erary  evidence,  as  much  as  the  genuineness  of  the 
pretended  preface  to  the  ^neid  or  of  a  particular 
stanza  which  appears  in  an  ode  of  Catullus.'^ 

Towards  summing  up  these  observations,  I  will 
remind  the  reader  that  those  who  believe  in  a 
Divine  Revelation,  as  pervading  or  as  contained  in 
the  Scriptures,  and  especially  those  who  accept  the 
full  doctrine  of  literalism  as  to  the  vehicle  of  that 
inspiration,  have  to  lay  their  account  with  the  fol- 
lowing (among  other)  considerations,  which  it  is 
hard  for  them  to  repudiate  as  inadmissible.  There 
may  possibly  h^ve  been  : 

1.  Imperfect  comprehension  of  that  which  was 
divinely  communicated. 

2.  Imperfect  expression  of  what  had  once  been 
comprehended. 

3.  Lapse  of  memory  in  oral  transmission. 

4.  Errors  of  copyists  in  written  transmission. 

5.  Changes  with  the  lapse  of  time  in  the  sense 
of  words. 

6.  Variations  arising  from  renderings  into  dif- 

1  Carm.  LII.  13-16. 


OF  HOL  y  SCRIPTURE.  1 1 

ferent  tongues,  especially  as  between  the  Hebrew 
text  and  the  Septuagint. 

7.  The  inspired  writers  of  the  New  Testament 
varied  in  the  text  they  used  for  citations  from  the 
Old  Testament,  and  did  not  regard  either  the 
Hebrew  or  the  Greek  as  of  exclusive  authority. 

8.  There  are  three  variant  chronologies  of  the 
Old  Testament,  according  to  the  Hebrew,  the  Sep- 
tuagint, and  the  Samaritan  Pentateuch  respec- 
tively; and  it  would  be  unwarrantable  to  claim  for 
any  one  of  them,  as  against  the  others,  the  absolute 
sanction  of  a  Divine  revelation;  while  an  historical 
argument  of  some  importance  may  be  deducible, 
on  the  other  hand,  from  the  fact  that  their  varia- 
tions lie  within  certain  limits. 

No  doubt  there  will  be  those  who  will  resent 
any  association  between  the  idea  of  a  Divine  reve- 
lation and  the  possibility  of  even  the  smallest 
intrusion  of  error  into  its  vehicle.  This  idea,  how- 
ever, is  by  no  means  altogether  a  novelty.  It  is 
manifestly  included  as  a  likelihood,  if  not  a  cer- 
tainty, in  the  fact    of  continuous  transmission  by 


12  THE  IMPREGNABLE  ROCK 

human  means,  without  continuous  miracle  to 
guarantee  it.  But,  further,  ought  they  not  to  bear 
in  mind  that  we  are  bound  by  the  rule  of  reason 
to  look  for  the  same  method  of  procedure  in  this 
great  matter  of  a  written  provision  of  Divine  knowl- 
edge for  our  needs  as  in  the  other  parts  of  the 
manifold  dispensation  under  which  Providence  has 
placed  us?  Now,  that  method  or  principle  is  one 
of  sufficiency,  not  of  perfection ;  of  sufficiency  for 
the  attainment  of  practical  ends,  not  of  conformity 
to  ideal  standards;  and  the  question  what  con- 
stitutes that  sufficiency  is  a  matter  no  more  to  be 
judged  of  by  us  in  relation  to  the  Scriptures,  than 
in  relation  to  any  other  part  of  the  Divine  dispensa- 
tions, on  all  of  which  the  Almighty  appears  to 
have  reserved  his  judgment  to  himself  Bishop 
Butler,  I  think,  would  wisely  tell  us  that  we  are 
not  the  judges,  and  that  we  are  quite  unfit  to  be 
the  judges,  what  may  be  the  proper  amount  and 
the  just  conditions  of  any  of  the  aids  to  be  afforded 
us  in  passing  through  the  discipline  of  life.  I 
will  only  remark  that  this  default  of  ideal  perfec- 


OF  HOL  V  SCRIPTURE.  1 3 

tion,  this  use  of  twilight  instead  of  a  noonday 
blaze,  may  be  adapted  to  our  weakness,  and  may 
be  among  the  appointed  means  of  exercising,  and 
by  exercise  of  strengthening,  our  faith.  But  what 
belongs  to  the  present  occasion  is  to  point  out 
that  if  probability,  and  not  demonstration,  marks 
the  Divine  guidance  of  our  paths  in  life  as  a  whole, 
we  are  not  entitled  to  require  that  when  the  Al- 
mighty, in  his  mercy,  makes  a  special  addition  by 
revelation  to  what  he  has  already  given  to  us  of 
knowledge  in  Nature  and  in  Providence,  that  special 
gift  should  be  unlike  his  other  gifts,  and  should 
have  all  its  lines  and  limits  drawn  out  with  mathe- 
matical precision. 

I  have  then  admitted,  I  hope  in  terms  of  suf- 
ficient fulness,  that  my  aim  in  no  way  embraces  a 
controversy  with  the  moderate,  or  even  with  the 
extreme,  developments  of  textual  criticism.  Dr. 
Driver,  the  Regius  Professor  of  Hebrew  at  Oxford,^ 
personally  as  well  as  officially  a  champion  of  the 
doctrine   that   there    is    a   Divine  revelation,   has 

1  Contemporary  Review,  February,  1890,  pp.  215-231. 


14  THE  IMPREGNABLE  ROCK 

recently  shown  with  great  clearness  and  ability 
that  the  basis  of  such  criticism  is  sound  and  un- 
deniable, whatever  be  its  liability  to  aberration 
either  in  method  or  in  details.  It  compares  con- 
sistencies and  inconsistencies  of  text,  not  simply  as 
would  be  done  by  an  ordinary  reader,  but  with  all 
the  lights  of  collateral  knowledge.  It  pronounces 
on  the  meaning  of  terms  with  the  authority  derived 
from  thorough  acquaintance  with  a  given  tongue, 
or  with  language  at  large.  It  investigates  and 
applies  those  laws  of  growth,  which  operate  upon 
language  as  they  operate  in  regard  to  a  physical 
organism. 

It  has  long  been  known,  for  example,  that 
portions  of  the  historical  books  of  the  Old  Testa- 
ment, such  as  the  Books  of  Chronicles,  were  of  a 
date  very  far  later  than  most  of  the  events  which 
they  record,  and  it  is  widely  believed^  that  a  por- 
tion of  the  prophecies  included   in  the   Book  of 

1 1  am  not  aware,  however,  what  is  the  reply  to  the  arguments  of 
Mr.  Urwick,  who  contends  for  the  unity  of  authorship  ("The  Serv- 
ant of  Jehovah."     Edinburgh:  Clark.     1877). 


OF  HOL  V  S  CRIPTURE,  1 5 

Isaiah  were  later  than  his  time.  It  now  pressed 
upon  us  that,  according  to  the  prevaihng  judgment 
of  the  learned,  the  form  in  which  the  older  books 
of  the  Old  Testament  have  come  down  to  us  does 
not  correspond  as  a  rule  with  their  titles,  and  is 
due  to  later  though  still,  as  is  largely  held,  to 
remote  periods ;  and  that  the  law  presented  to  us 
in  the  Pentateuch  is  not  an  enactment  of  a  single 
date,  but  has  been  enlarged  by  a  process  of  growth, 
and  by  gradual  accretions.  To  us  who  are  with- 
out original  means  of  judgment  these  are,  at  first 
hearing,  without  doubt,  disturbing  announcements. 
Yet  common  sense  requires  us  to  say,  let  them  be 
fought  out  by  the  competent,  but  let  not  us  who 
are  incompetent  interfere.  I  utterly,  then,  eschew 
for  myself  the  responsibility  of  conflict  with  these 
properly  critical  conclusions. 

But  this  acquiescence  is  subject  to  the  following 
remarks.  First,  the  acceptance  of  the  conclusions 
of  the  critics  has  reference  to  the  present  literary 
form  of  the  works,  and  leaves  entirely  open  every 
question  relating  to  the  substance.     Any  one  who 


1 6  THE  IMPREGNABLE  ROCK 

reads  the  books  of  the  Pentateuch,  from  the  second 
to  the  fifth,  must  observe  how  Httle  they  present  the 
appearance  of  consecutive,  coherent,  and  digested 
record.  But  their  several  portions  must  be  con- 
sidered on  the  evidence  appHcable  to  them  respec- 
tively. And  the  main  facts  of  the  history  they  contain 
have  received  strong  confirmation  from  Egyptian 
and  Eastern  research.  With  regard  to  the  Book 
of  Genesis,  the  admission  which  has  been  made 
implies  nothing  adverse  to  the  truth  of  the  tra- 
ditions it  embodies,  nothing  adverse  to  their  an- 
tiquity, nothing  which  excludes  or  discredits,  as 
to  the  older  among  them,  the  idea  of  their  having 
originally  formed  part  of  a  primitive  revelation, 
simultaneous  or  successive.  The  forms  of  expres- 
sion may  have  changed,  yet  the  substance  may 
remain  with  an  altered  literary  form;  as  some 
scholars  have  thought  (not,  I  believe,  rightly)  that 
the  diction  and  modeling  of  the  Homeric  Poems 
is  comparative  modern,  and  yet  the  matter  they 
embody  may  belong  to  a  remote  antiquity.  It  is 
also  conceivable  that  the  diction  of  Chaucer,  for 


OF  HOL  V  SCRIPTURE.  I  / 

example,  might  be  altered  so  as  to  conform  to  the 
usage  of  the  nineteenth  century,  and  to  leave  little 
apparent  resemblance  to  the  original,  and  yet  the 
whole  substance  of  Chaucer  might  remain. 

Further,  our  assent  to  the  conclusions  of  the 
critics  ought  to  be  strictly  limited  to  a  provisional 
and  revocable  assent;  and  this  on  practical  grounds 
of  stringent  obligation.  For,  firstly,  these  conclu- 
sions appear  to  be  in  a  great  measure  floating  and 
uncertain,  to  be  the  subject  of  manifold  controversy. 
Secondly,  they  seem  to  shift  and  vary  with  rapidity 
in  the  minds  of  those  who  hold  them.  In  editing 
and  revising  the  work  of  Bleek,^  Wellhausen  ac- 
cepts in  a  great  degree  the  genuineness  of  those 
Davidic  Psalms  which  are  contained  in  the  First 
Book  of  the  Psalter.     But  I  have  been  told  that 

1  "  Einleitung  in  das  Alte  Testament."  Haupttheil  I.,  C.  Die 
Psalmen.  [The  edition  published  and  adopted  by  Wellhausen,  to 
which  I  refer,  is  dated  1878 ;  but  the  book  had  been  published  in 
i860.]  So  recently  as  in  the  fifth  edition  (Berlin,  1886),  the  Bleek- 
Wellhausen  work  assigns  much  weight  to  the  Davidic  titles ;  gives  to 
David  nearly  fifty  Psalms ;  and  holds  that  there  is  no  Psalm  later  than 
Nehemiah,  few  so  late.  (Sections  220-222,  pages  457-464,  of  the 
Einleitung.^ 

2 


1 8  THE  IMPREGNABLE  ROCK 

this  position  has  been  abandoned,  and  that,  stand- 
ing, as  he  appears  to  do,  at  the  head  of  the  nega- 
tive critics,  he  now  brings  down  the  general  body 
of  the  Psalms  to  a  date  very  greatly  below  that  of 
the  Babylonic  exile.  It  is  certainly  unreasonable 
to  hold  a  critic  to  his  conclusions  without  excep- 
tion. But,  on  the  other  hand,  it  may  be  asked 
whether,  in  order  to  warrant  confidence,  they  ought 
not  to  exhibit  some  element  of  stability.  The 
opening  of  new  sources  of  information  may  justify 
all  changes  fairly  referable  to  them;  and  in  minor 
matters  the  finer  touches  of  the  destructive,  as  well 
as  the  constructive,  artist  may  be  needed  to  com- 
plete his  work.  But  if  reasonable  grounds  for 
change  do  not  determine  its  bounds,  there  must  be 
limits  on  the  other  hand  to  the  duty  of  deference 
and  submission  on  the  part  of  the  outer  and  unin- 
structed  world,  with  respect  to  these  literary  con- 
clusions. It  seems  doubtful  how  far  they  present 
to  us  that  aggregate  continuity  and  progression 
which  the  whole  world  recognizes  in  the  case  of 
the  physical  sciences;  and  the  most  liberal  estimate 


OF  HOL  Y  SCRIPTURE.  1 9 

can  hardly  carry  them  farther  than  this,  that  we 
should  keep  an  open  mind  till  the  cycle  of  change 
has  been  run  through,  and  till  time  has  been  given 
for  the  detection  of  flaws,  and  for  the  hearing  of 
those  whose  researches  may  have  led  them  to 
different  results. 

In  the  present  instance  we  have  an  example  which 
may  not  be  without  force  in  support  of  this  warning. 
Mr.  Margoliouth,  the  Laudian  Professor  of  Arabic 
at  Oxford,  and  a  gentleman  of  early  academical 
distinctions  altogether  extraordinary,  has  published 
his  Inaugural  Lecture/  in  which  he  states  his  belief 
that,  from  materials  and  by  means  which  he  lucidly 
explains,  it  will  be  found  possible  to  reconstruct  the 
Semitic  original,  hitherto  unknown,  of  the  Book  of 
Ecclesiasticus.  It  was  written,  as  he  states,  by  Ben 
Sira,  not  in  the  Hebrew  of  the  Prophets,  but  in  the 
later  Hebrew  of  the  Rabbis  (p.  6).  I  understand 
that  there  are  three  great  stages,  or  states,  of  the 
Hebrew  tongue, — the  Ancient,  the  Middle,  and  the 

1  "  On  the  Place  of  Ecclesiasticus  in  Semitic  Literature,"  Clarendon 
Press.     1890. 


20  THE  IMPREGNABLE  ROCK 

New;  and  that  of  these  the  earlier  or  classical  Scrip- 
tures belong  to  the  first,  and  the  Book  of  Nehe- 
miah  (for  example)  to  the  second.  The  third  is 
the  Rabbinical  stage.  The  passage  from  one  to 
another  of  these  stages  is  held,  under  the  laws 
which  determine  the  movement  of  that  language, 
to  require  a  very  long  time.  Professor  Margoliouth 
finds  that  Ben  Sira  wrote  in  Rabbinical  Hebrew, 
and  the  earlier  we  find  Rabbinical  Hebrew  in  use, 
the  farther  we  drive  into  antiquity  the  dates  of 
books  written  in  middle  and  in  ancient  Hebrew. 
Suppose,  by  way  of  illustration,  that  Professor 
Margoliouth  shows  Rabbinical  Hebrew  to  have 
come  into  use  two  hundred  years  earlier  than  had 
been  supposed,  the  effect  is  to  throw  back  by  two 
hundred  years  the  latest  date  to  which  a  book  in 
middle  or  in  ancient  Hebrew  could  be  assigned. 
No  wonder,  then,  that  Professor  Margoliouth  ob- 
serves (p.  22): 

"Some  students  are  engaged  in  bringing  down 
the  date  of  every  chapter  in  the  Bible  so  late  as 
to  leave  no  room  for  prophecy  and  revelation." 


OF  HOL  V  SCRIPTURE.  2 1 

But  he  goes  on  to  add  that  if,  by  the  task  which 
he  has  undertaken,  and  by  those  who  may  follow 
and  improve  upon  him,  this  book  shall  be  properly 
restored,  "  others  will  endeavor  to  find  out  how  early 
the  professedly  post-exilian  books  can  be  put  back, 
so  as  to  account  for  the  divergence  between  their 
awkward  Middle-Hebrew  and  the  rich  and  eloquent 
New-Hebrew  of  Ben  Sira.  However  this  may  be, 
hypotheses  which  place  any  portion  of  the  classical 
or  Old-Hebrew  Scriptures  between  the  Middle- 
Hebrew  of  Nehemiah  and  the  New-Hebrew  of  Ben 
Sira  will  surely  require  some  reconsideration,  or  at 
least  have  to  be  harmonized  in  some  way  with  the 
history  of  the  language,  before  they  can  be  uncon- 
ditionally accepted." 

Hence  the  spectator  from  without,  perceiving 
that  there  is  war,  waged  on  critical  grounds,  in  the 
critical  camp  itself,  may  surmise  that  what  has  been 
wittily  called  the  order  of  disorder  is  more  or  less 
menaced  in  its  central  seat;  and  he  may  be  the 
more  hardened  in  his  determination  not  to  rush 
prematurely  to  final  conclusions    on  the  serious, 


22  THE  IMPREGNABLE  ROCK 

though  not  as  I  suppose  vital,  question  respecting 
the  age  and  authenticity  of  the  early  books  of  the 
Old  Testament  in  their  present  literary  form. 

There  is  such  a  thing  as  mistaking  the  indif- 
ferent for  the  essential,  and  as  a  slavish  adherence 
to  traditions  insufficiently  examined.  But  the  lia- 
bilities of  human  nature  to  error  do  not  all  lie  on 
one  side.  It  may,  on  the  contrary,  be  stated  with 
some  confidence  that  when  error  in  a  certain 
direction  after  a  long  precedence  is  effectively 
called  to  account,  it  is  generally  apt,  and  in  some 
cases  certain,  to  be  followed  by  a  reign  of  preju- 
dices or  biased  judgments  more  or  less  extended, 
and  in  a  contrary  direction.  There  is  such  a  thing 
as  a  warping  of  the  mind  in  favor  of  disintegration. 
Often  does  a  critic  bring  to  the  book  he  examines 
the  conclusion  which  he  believes  that  he  has  drawn 
from  it.  Often  when  he  has  not  thus  imported 
it,  yet  the  first  view,  in  remote  perspective,  of  the 
proposition  to  which  he  leans,  will  induce  him  to 
rush  at  the  most  formidable  fences  that  lie  straight 
ahead  of  him,  instead    of  taking   his  chances   of 


OF  HOL  V  SCRIPTURE.  23 

arriving  at  it  by  the  common  road  of  reason.  And 
often,  even  when  he  has  attained  his  conclusion 
without  prejudice,  he  will,  after  adopting,  defend  it 
against  objectors,  not  with  argument  only,  but  with 
all  the  pride  and  pain  of  wounded  self-love.  And 
every  one  of  these  dangers  is  commonly  enhanced 
in  something  like  the  same  proportion  in  which 
the  particular  subject-matter  embraces  the  highest 
interests  of  mankind. 

What  I  would  specially  press  upon  those  to 
whom  I  write  is  that  they  should  look  broadly 
and  largely  at  the  subject  of  Holy  Scripture, 
especially  of  the  Scriptures  of  the  older  dispensa- 
tion, v/hich  are,  so  to  speak,  farther  from  the  eye, 
and  should  never  allow  themselves  to  be  won  away 
from  that  broad  and  large  contemplation  into  dis- 
cussions which,  though  in  their  own  place  legiti- 
mate,—  nay,  needful, — yet  are  secondary,  and 
therefore,  when  substituted  for  the  primaiy,  are 
worse  than  frivolous.  I  do  not  ask  this  fi'om  them 
as  philosophers  or  as  Christians,  but  as  men  of 
sense.     I  ask  them  to  look  at  the  subject  as  they 


24  THE  IMPREGNABLE  ROCK 

would  look  at  the  British  Constitution,  or  at  the 
poetry  of  Shakespeare.  If  we  were  pressed  by 
the  apparent  absurdity  that  any  one  branch  of 
the  British  Legislature  can  stop  the  proceedings 
of  the  whole,  or  that  the  House  of  Commons  can 
reduce  to  beggary  the  whole  Army,  Navy,  and 
Civil  Service  of  the  country,  and  that  neither  law 
nor  usage  makes  any  provision  for  meeting  the 
case,  and  this  although  there  would  ensue  from  it 
nothing  less  than  a  frustration  of  the  purposes  for 
which  men  join  together  in  society,  still  there  are 
probably  not  ten  men  in  the  country  whose  estimate 
of  the  Constitution  they  live  under  would  be  affected 
by  these  supererogatory  objections.  And  if  we  are 
in  any  measure  to  grasp  the  office,  dignity,  and 
authority  of  the  Scriptures,  we  must  not  suppose 
we  are  dealing  adequately  with  that  lofty  subject 
by  exhausting  thought  and  time  in  examining 
whether  Moses  either  edited  or  wrote  the  Penta- 
teuch just  as  it  stands,  or  what  was  the  book  of 
the  law  found  in  the  temple  in  the  tim.e  of  Josiah, 
or  whether  it  is  possible  or  likely  that  any  changes 


OF  HOL  V  S CRIPTURE.  25 

of  addition  or  omission  may  have  crept  into  the 
text.  If  the  most  greedily  destructive  among  all 
the  theories  of  the  modern  critics  (rather  seriously 
at  variance  with  one  another)  were  established  as 
true,  it  would  not  avail  to  impair  the  great  facts  of 
the  history  of  man  with  respect  to  the  Jews  and  to 
the  nations  of  the  world;  nor  to  disguise  the  light 
which  those  facts  throw  upon  the  pages  of  the 
Sacred  Volume;  nor  to  abate  the  commanding 
force  with  which,  bathed,  so  to  speak,  in  the  flood 
of  that  light,  the  Bible  invites,  attracts,  and  com- 
mands the  adhesion  of  mankind.  Even  the  moral 
problems,  which  may  be  raised  as  to  particular 
portions  of  the  volume,  and  which  may  not  have 
found  any  absolute  and  certain  solution,  are  surely 
lost  in  the  comprehensive  contemplation  of  its 
general  strain,  its  immeasurable  loftiness  of  aim, 
and  the  vastness  of  the  results  which  it,  and  its 
immediate  accompaniments  in  institution  and  event, 
have  wrought  for  our  predecessors  in  the  journey 
of  life,  for  ourselves,  and  for  the  most  forward, 
dominant,  and  responsible  portions  of  our  race. 


26  THE  IMPREGNABLE  ROCK 

In  a  passage  which  rises  to  the  very  highest 
level  of  British  eloquence,  Dr.  Liddon/  exhausting 
all  the  resources  of  our  language,  has  described,  so 
far  as  man  may  describe  it,  the  ineffable  and  unap- 
proachable position  held  by  the  Sacred  Volume.  It 
is  too  long  to  quote,  too  special  to  appropriate; 
and  to  make  extracts  would  only  mangle  it.  The 
commanding  eminence  of  the  great  preacher  of  our 
metropolitan  Cathedral  will  fasten  the  public  atten- 
tion on  the  subject,  and  powerfully  serve  to  shov/ 
that  the  Scriptures,  in  their  substantial  tissue,  rise 
far  above  the  region  of  criticism,  which  shows  no 
sign  of  being  about  to  do  anything  permanent  or 
effectual  to  lower  their  moral  and  spiritual  gran- 
deur, or  to  disguise  or  intercept  their  gigantic  work. 

I  turn  to  a  cognate  topic.  The  impression  pre- 
vails that  in  this  and  other  countries  the  operative 
classes,  as  they  are  termed,  have  at  the  great  cen- 
ters of  population,  here  and  elsewhere,  largely  lost 

1  Sermon  preached  at  St.  Paul's  on  the  Second  Sunday  m  Advent, 
December,  18S9  ;  pp.  28-31.  [Since  this  was  written,  death  has  extin- 
guished in  Dr.  Liddon  a  light  of  the  English  Church,  singularly  bright 
and  pure.] 


OF  HOL  V  SCRIPTURE.  2/ 

their  hold  upon  the  Christian  creed.  There  may 
be  exaggeration  in  this  behef ;  but,  all  things  taken 
together,  there  is  evidently  a  degree  of  foundation 
for  it.  It  does  not  mean,  at  least  among  us,  that 
they  have  lost  respect  for  the  Christian  religion,  or 
for  its  ministers ;  or  that  they  desire  their  children 
to  be  brought  up  otherwise  than  in  the  knowledge 
and  practice  of  it;  or  that  they  themselves  have 
snapped  the  last  ties  which,  on  the  cardinal  occa- 
sions of  existence,  associate  them  with  its  ordi- 
nances ;  or  that  they  have  renounced  or  modified 
the  moral  standards  of  conduct  which  its  conspicu- 
ous victory,  after  an  obstinate  contest  of  many  cen- 
turies, and  its  long  possession  of  the  social  field, 
have  established.  It  means  no  more,  but  also  no 
less,  than  this,  that  their  positive,  distinct  acceptance 
of  the  articles  of  the  Creed,  and  their  sense  of  the 
dignity  and  value  of  the  Sacred  Record,  are  blunted, 
or  in  some  cases  even  effaced.^ 

1  As  I  write  in  the  general  interests  of  belief,  and  on  no  narrower 
ground,  it  is  with  deep  regret  that  I  extract  the  following  statement 
from  the  excellent  compilation  of  Messrs.  Macmillan,  termed  the 
Statesman's  Year-Book,  for  1890.     In  France,  account  is  taken,  at  the 


28  THE  IMPREGNABLE  ROCK 

In  passing,  I  may  be  permitted  to  observe  that 
if  assent  be  more  or  less  largely  withheld  by  the 
less  well-to-do  segment  of  society,  it  is  still,  not- 
withstanding the  skeptical  movement  of  the  day, 
very  generally  yielded,  in  England,  by  the  leisured 
and  better  provided  classes  in  most,  though  not 
all,  of  their  branches.  I  simply  state  this  as  fact, 
without  drawing,  in  this  case,  any  inference. 

There  seems  thus  to  be,  within  certain  limits, 
an  approach  to  a  reversal  of  the  respective  atti- 
tudes which  prevailed  in  the  infancy  of  our  re- 
ligion. Then  the  "poor"  were  the  principal  ob- 
jects of  the  personal  ministry  of  Christ  our  Lord, 
and  it  was  their  glory  to  be  the  readiest  receivers 
of  the  gospel.  They  were  then,  "the  poor  of 
this  world,  rich  in  faith,  and  heirs  of  the  king- 
dom which  he  hath  promised  to  them  that  love 
hnn"  (James  2  :  5).  They  had  fewer  obstacles, 
especially  within  themselves,  to  prevent  their  ac- 

census,  of  religious  beliof,  and  in  1881,  for  the  first  time,  a  column  was 
provided  for  those  who  declined  to  make  any  declaration  of  belief. 
The  number  ol  persons  returned  under  this  head  is  no  less  than 
7,684,906. 


OF  HOL  Y  SCRIPTURE.  29 

cepting  the  new  religion.  It  was  less  hard  for 
them  to  become  "  as  little  children."  They  had, 
to  all  appearance,  more  palpable  interests  in  the 
promise  of  the  life  to  come,  as  compared  with  the 
possession  of  the  life  that  now  is.  The  seeming 
change  in  their  comparative  facility  of  access  to 
the  Saviour,  as  respects  belief,  is  one  to  afford  much 
matter  for  meditation.  The  present  purpose  is  to 
deal,  in  slight  outline  at  least,  with  one  of  its  causes. 
For  one  such  cause  certainly  is  the  wide,  though 
more  or  less  vague,  disparagement  of  the  Holy 
Scriptures  recently  observable  in  the  surface  cur- 
rents of  prevalent  opinion,  as  regards  their  title  to 
supply  in  a  supreme  degree  food  for  the  religious 
thought  of  man,  and  authoritative  guidance  for 
his  life. 

Amongst  the  suppositions,  I  believe  erroneous, 
which  tend  to  produce  this  disparagement,  are  the 
following : 

I.  That  the  conclusions  of  science  as  to  natural 
objects  have  shaken  or  destroyed  the  assertions  of 
the  early  Scriptures  with  respect  to  the  origin  and 


30  THE  IMPREGNABLE  ROCK 

history  of  the   world,  and   of  man,  its   principal 
inhabitant. 

2.  That  their  contents  are  in  many  cases  offen- 
sive to  the  moral  sense,  and  unworthy  of  an 
enlightened  age. 

3.  That  our  race  made  its  appearance  in  the  world 
in  a  condition  but  one  degree  above  that  of  the 
brute  creation,  and  only  by  slow  and  painful  but 
continual  progress  has  brought  itself  up  to  the 
present  level  of  its  existence. 

4.  That  men  have  accomplished  this  by  the  exer- 
cise of  their  natural  powers,  and  have  never  received 
the  special  teaching  and  authoritative  guidance 
which  is  signified  under  the  name  of  Divine 
Revelation. 

5.  That  the  more  considerable  among  the  dif- 
ferent races  and  nations  of  the  world  have  devised 
and  established  from  time  to  time  their  respective 
religions,  and  have  in  many  cases  accepted  the  pro- 
mulgation of  sacred  books,  which  are  to  be  con- 
sidered as  essentially  of  the  same  character  with 
the  Bible. 


OF  HOL  Y  SCRIPTURE,  3 1 

6.  That  the  books  of  the  Bible,  in  many  most 
important  instances,  and  especially  those  books  of 
the  Old  Testament  which  purport  to  be  the  earliest, 
so  far  from  being  contemporaiy  with  the  events 
which  they  record,  or  with  the  authors  to  whom 
they  are  ascribed,  are  comparatively  recent  com- 
pilations from  uncertain  sources,  and  are  therefore 
without  authority. 

Most  of  the  foregoing  remarks  relate  to  the 
last  of  these  assumptions;  and  I  shall  proceed  to 
observe  upon  others  among  them. 

There  are  propositions  wider  still,  but  wholly 
foreign  to  the  present  purpose, — such  as  that  God 
is  essentially  unknowable,  that  we  have  no  reason- 
able evidence  of  a  life  beyond  the  grave,  and  that 
rational  certainty  is  confined  to  material  objects 
and  to  the  testimony  of  the  senses.  Passing  by 
these  propositions,  I  confine  myself  wholly  to  what 
preceded  them;  and  I  shall  endeavor,  from  some 
points  of  view,  to  present  an  opposing  view  of  the 
spiritual  field.  Moreover,  as  each  of  these  is  the 
subject  of  a  literature   of  its  own  which   may  be 


32  THE  IMPREGNABLE  ROCK 

termed  scientific,  I  here  premise  that  what  I  have 
to  say  will,  though,  I  hope,  rational  and  true,  be  not 
systematic  or  complete,  but  popular  and  partial 
only,  and  will  have  for  its  immediate  aim  to  show 
that  there  are  grave  reasons  for  questioning  every 
really  destructive  proposition  that  has  been  ad- 
vanced, and  for  withholding  our  assent  from  them 
until  these  reasons  (and,  as  I  conceive,  many  others) 
shall  be  confuted  and  set  aside. 

I  shall,  however,  as  being  in  duty  bound  to 
follow  the  truth  so  far  as  I  can  discern  it,  have  to 
make  many  confessions,  in  the  course  of  my  argu- 
ment, to  the  prejudice,  not,  as  I  trust,  of  Christian 
belief  or  of  the  sacred  volume,  but  only  of  us,  who, 
as  its  students,  have  failed  gravely,  and  at  many 
points,  in  the  duty  of  a  temperate  and  cautious 
treatment  of  it, — as  unhappily  we  have  also  failed, 
and  often  more  grossly  failed,  in  every  other  duty. 
But,  as  the  lines  and  laws  of  duty  at  large  remain 
unobscured,  notwithstanding  the  imperfections 
everywhere  diffused,  so  we  may  trust  that  suffi- 
cient light  yet  remains  for  us,   if  duly  followed, 


OF  HOL  V  SCRIPTURE.  3  3 

whereby  to  establish  the  authority  and  sufficiency 
of  Holy  Scripture  for  its  high  moral  and  spiritual 
purposes.  For  the  present,  I  have  endeavored  to 
point  out  that  the  operations  of  criticism  properly 
so  called,  affecting  as  they  do  the  literary  form  of 
the  books,  leave  the  questions  of  substance,  namely, 
those  of  history,  miracle,  and  revelation,  substan- 
tially where  they  found  them.  I  shall  in  several 
succeeding  papers  strive  to  show,  at  least  by  speci- 
mens, that  science  and  research  have  done  much  to 
sustain  the  historical  credit  of  the  Old  Testament ; 
that  in  doing  this  they  have  added  strength  to  the 
argument  which  contends  that  in  them  we  find  a 
Divine  revelation;  and  that  the  evidence,  rationally 
viewed,  both  of  contents  and  of  results,  binds  us  to 
stand  where  our  forefathers  have  stood,  upon  the 
impregnable  rock  of  Holy  Scripture. 


II. 

THE   CREATION   STORY, 

"  The  rising  birth 
Of  Nature  from  the  unapparent  deep." 

Par.  Lost.,  B.  VI I. 

In  recent  controversies  on  the  trustworthiness  of 
the  Scripture  record,  much  has  been  thought  to 
turn  on  the  Creation  Story;  and  the  special  and 
separate  importance  thus  attached  to  it  has  given 
it  a  separate  and  prominent  position  in  the  pubHc 
view.  This  constitutes  in  itself  a  reason  for  ad- 
dressing ourselves  at  once  to  the  consideration  of 
it,  apart  from  any  more  general  investigation  touch- 
ing either  the  older  Scriptures  at  large,  or  any  of 
the  books  which  collectively  compose  them. 

But  there  are  broader  and  deeper  reasons  for 

this  separate  consideration.     It  is  suggested,  first, 

by  the  form  which  has  been  given  to  the  relation 

itself.     The  narrative,   given  with  wonderful   suc- 
34 


THE  CREA  TION  STOR  V.  35 

cinctness  in  the  first  chapter  of  the  Book  of  Genesis, 
and  in  the  first  three  verses  of  the  second  chapter, 
stands  distinct  in  essential  points  from  all  that  fol- 
lows in  the  Scriptures.  It  is  a  solitary  and  striking 
example  of  the  detailed  exposition  of  physical  facts. 
For  such  an  example  we  must  suppose  a  purpose, 
and  we  have  to  inquire  what  that  purpose  was. 
Next,  it  seems  as  it  were  to  trespass  on  the  ground 
of  science,  and,  independently  of  investigation  and 
of  evidence,  to  assert  a  rival  authority.  And  further, 
forming  no  part,  unless  towards  its  close,  of  the 
history  of  man,  and  nowhere  touching  directly  on 
human  action,  it  severs  itself  from  the  rest  of  the 
Sacred  Volume,  and  appears  more  as  a  preface  to 
the  history,  than  as  a  part  of  it. 

And  yet  there  are  signs,  in  subsequent  portions 
of  the  Volume,  that  this  tale  of  the  Creation  was 
regarded  by  the  Hebrews  as  both  authoritative  and 
important.  For  it  gave  form  and  shape  to  portions 
of  their  literature  in  the  central  department  of  its 
devotions.  Nay,  traces  of  it  may,  perhaps,  be  found 
in  the  Book  of  Job  (Job  38),  where  the  Almighty 


36  THE  CREA  TION  STOR  Y. 

challenges  the  patriarch  on  the  primordial  works 
of  creation.  More  clearly  in  Psalm  104,  where  we 
have  light,  the  firmament,  the  waters  and  their 
severance  and  confinement  within  bounds ;  a  suc- 
cession the  same  as  in  Genesis.  Then  follow 
mixedly  the  animal  and  vegetable  creations,  and 
man  as  the  climax  crowns  the  series  in  verse  23. 
So  in  Psalm  148  we  have  first  (vs.  1-6)  the  heavens, 
the  heavenly  bodies,  and  the  atmosphere;  then, 
again  mixedly,  the  earth  and  the  agents  affecting 
it,  with  the  animate  population  (vs.  7-10),  and 
lastly  man.  If  there  be  some  variation  in  the  order 
of  the  details,  still  the  idea  of  consecutive  develop- 
ment, or  evolution,  which  struck  so  forcibly  the 
intelligence  of  Haeckel,  is  clearly  impressed  upon 
the  whole.  At  a  later  date,  and  only  (so  far  as 
is  known)  in  the  Greek  tongue,  we  find  a  more 
nearly  exact  resemblance  in  the  Song  of  the  Three 
Children.  The  heavenly  bodies  and  phenomena 
occupy  the  first  division  of  the  Song ;  then  the 
earth  is  invoked  to  bless  the  Lord,  with  its  moun- 
tains, vegetation,   and   waters;    then   the   animate 


THE  CREA  TION  STOR  Y.  37 

population  of  water,  air,  and  land,  in  the  order 
pursued  in  the  first  chapter  of  Genesis,  and  with 
the  same  remarkable  omission  of  the  ereat  kino-- 
dom  of  the  Reptiles  at  their  proper  place.  Then 
follow  the  children  of  Men,  and  these  fill  the  clos- 
ing portion  of  the  Song.  The  most  noteworthy 
differences  (which,  however,  are  quite  secondary) 
seem  to  be  that  there  is  no  mention  of  the  first 
beginnings  of  vegetation,  and  no  supplemental 
notice,  as  in  Genesis  i  :  24-30,  of  the  reptiles. 

But  also  the  sun,  moon,  and  stars,  which  are  cate- 
gorically placed  later  in  Genesis  than  vegetation, 
precede  in  the  Song  any  notice  of  the  earth.  Let 
not  this  difference  be  hastily  called  a  discrepancy. 
Each  mode  is  to  be  explained  by  considering  the 
character  and  purpose  of  the  composition.  In 
Genesis,  it  is  a  narrative  of  the  action ;  in  the  Sono- 
it  is  a  panorama  of  the  spectacle.  Genesis,  as  a  rule, 
refers  each  of  the  great  factors  of  the  visible  world 
to  its  due  order  of  origin  in  time;  the  Song  enumer- 
ates the  particulars  as  they  are  presented  to  the 
eye  in  a  picture,  where  the  transcendent  eminence 


38  THE  CREA  TION  STOR  V. 

of  the  heavenly  bodies  as  they  are,  and  especially 
of  the  sun,  gives  to  this  group  a  proper  priority. 

But  this  Creation  Story  may  have  an  importance 
for  us  even  greater  than  it  had  for  the  Hebrews,  or 
than  it  could  have  in  any  of  those  ages  when  all 
men  believed,  perhaps  even  too  freely,  in  special 
modes  of  communication  from  the  Deity  to  man, 
and  had  not  a  stock  of  courage  or  of  audacity 
sufficient  to  question  the  possibility  of  a  Divine 
revelation.  For  we  have  now  to  bear  in  mind  that 
the  Book  of  Genesis  generally  contains  a  portion 
of  human  history,  and  that  all  human  history  is  a 
record  of  human  experience.  It  is  not  so  with  the 
introductory  recital;  for  the  contents  of  it  lie  out- 
side of  and  anterior  to  the  very  earliest  human 
experience.  How  came,  then,  this  recital  into  the 
possession  of  a  portion  of  mankind? 

It  is  conceivable  that  a  theory  of  Creation  and 
of  the  ordering  of  the  world  might  be  bodied  forth 
in  poetry,  or  might  under  given  circumstances 
be,  as  now,  based  on  the  researches  of  natural 
science. 


THE  CREA  TION  STOR  V.  39 

But,  in  the  first  place,  this  recital  cannot  be  due 
to  the  mere  imagination  of  a  poet.  It  is  in  a  high 
degree,  as  we  shall  see,  methodical  and  elaborate. 
And  there  is  nothing  either  equaling  or  within 
many  degrees  approaching  it,  which  can  be  set 
down  to  the  account  of  poetry  in  other  spheres  of 
primitive  antiquity,  whatever  their  poetical  opu- 
lence may  have  been.  Further,  the  early  Hebrews 
do  not  appear  to  have  cultivated  or  developed  any 
poetical  faculty  at  all,  except  that  which  was  ex- 
hibited in  strictly  religious  work,  such  as  the  devo- 
tions of  the  Psalms,  and  (principally)  the  discourses 
and  addresses  of  the  Prophets. 

As  they  were  not,  in  a  general  sense,  poetical, 
so  neither  were  they  in  any  sense  scientific.  By 
tradition  and  by  positive  records  we  know  pretty 
well  what  kinds  of  knowledge  were  pursued  in 
very  early  ages.  They  were  most  strictly  practical. 
Take,  for  example,  astronomy  among  the  Chaldees, 
or  medicine  among  the  Egyptians.  The  necessities 
of  life  then,  as  now,  pressed  upon  man.  We  may 
say  with  much  confidence  that  in  remote  antiquity 


40  THE  CREA  TION  STOR  V. 

there  existed  no  science  like  geology,  aiming  to 
give  a  history  of  the  earth.  So,  again,  there  was 
no  cosmogony,  professing  to  convey  a  history  of 
the  kosvios  as  then  understood,  which  would  have 
included,  together  with  the  earth,  the  sun,  moon, 
planets,  and  atmosphere. 

When,  at  a  later  date,  speculation  on  physical 
origins  began,  it  was  rather  on  the  prim.ary  idea 
than  on  any  systematic  arrangement  or  succes- 
sion. With  the  Ionic,  which  was  the  earliest 
school  of  philosophy,  the  human  intelligence  was 
mainly  busied  in  contending  for  one  or  other  of 
the  known  material  elements,  as  entitled  to  the 
honors  of  the  primordial  cause.  Nor  had  even 
the  Greeks  or  Romans  formulated  any  scheme 
in  any  degree  approaching  that  of  Genesis  for 
order  and  method,  so  late  as  the  time  when  they 
became  acquainted  with  the  Hebrew  Scriptures 
through  their  translation  into  Greek.  The  open- 
ing statement  of  Ovid  in  the  "  Metamorphoses  " 
is  remarkable ;  but  at  the  time  when  he  wrote, 
the  Book  of  Genesis  had  been  accessible  to  edu- 


THE  CREA  TION  S  TOR  V.  4 1 

cated  persons  in  what  was  then  the  chief  literary 
language  of  the  Romans.  There  is  not,  then,  the 
smallest  ground  for  treating  the  Mosaic  cosmogony, 
whether  in  the  way  of  original  or  copy,  as  the  off- 
spring of  scientific  inquiry. 

To  speak  of  it  as  guess-work  would  be  irrational. 
There  were  no  materials  for  guessing.  There  was 
no  purpose  to  be  served  by  guessing.  For  a  rec- 
ord of  the  formation  of  the  world  we  find  no  pur- 
pose in  connection  with  the  ordinary  necessities  or 
conveniences  of  life.  Not  to  mention  that  down  to 
this  day  there  exists  no  cosmogony  which  can  be 
called  scientific,  though  there  are  theories  both  in- 
genious and  beautiful  which  apparently  are  coming 
to  be  more  and  more  accepted;  these,  however, 
being  of  an  origin  decidedly  late  even  in  the  his- 
tory of  modern  physics. 

But,  further,  as  the  Tale  of  Creation  is  not  poetry, 
nor  is  it  science,  so  neither,  according  to  its  own 
aspect  or  profession,  is  it  theory  at  all.  The 
method  here  pursued  is  that  of  historical  recital. 
The  person,  who  composes  or  transmits  it,  seems 


42  THE  CREATION  STORY. 

to  believe,  and  to  intend  others  to  believe,  that  he 
is  dealing  with  matters  of  fact.  But  these  matters 
of  fact  were,  from  the  nature  of  the  case,  altogether 
inaccessible  to  inquiry,  and  impossible  to  attain  by 
our  ordinary  mental  faculties  of  perception  or  re- 
flection, inasmuch  as  they  date  before  the  creation 
of  our  race.  If  it  is,  as  it  surely  professes  to  be,  a 
serious  conveyance  of  truth,  it  can  only  be  a  com- 
munication from  the  Most  High;  a  communication 
to  man  and  for  the  use  of  man,  therefore  in  a  form 
adapted  to  his  mind  and  to  his  use.  If,  thus  con- 
sidered, it  is  true,  then  it  carries  stamped  upon  it 
the  proof  of  a  Divine  revelation ;  an  assertion  which 
cannot  commonly  be  sustained  from  the  nature  of 
the  contents  as  to  this  or  that  minute  portion  of 
Scripture  at  large. 

If,  when  thus  considered,  it  proves  not  to  be  true, 
we  then  have  to  consider  what  account  of  it  we  are 
in  a  condition  to  give.  I  cannot  say  that  to  me 
this  appears  an  easy  undertaking.  "  If,"  says  Pro- 
fessor Dana,  with  much  reason,  "it  be  true  that 
the  narration  in  Genesis  has  no  support  in  natural 


THE  CREA  TION  STOR  V.  43 

science,  it  would  have  been  better  for  its  re- 
ligious character  that  all  the  verses  between  the 
first  and  those  on  the  creation  of  man  had  been 
omitted."  ^ 

But  the  truth,  or  trueness,  of  which  I  speak,  is 
truth  or  trueness  as  conveyed  to  and  comprehended 
by  the  mind  of  man,  and,  further,  by  the  mind  of 
man  in  a  comparatively  untrained  and  infant  state. 
I  cannot  indeed  wholly  shut  out  from  view  the 
possibility  that  casual  imperfections  may  have 
crept  into  the  record.  Setting  aside,  however,  that 
possibility,  let  us  consider  the  conditions  of  the 
case  as  they  are  exhibited  to  us  by  reasonable 
likelihood;  for,  if  the  communication  were  divine, 
we  may  be  certain  that  it  would  on  that  account 
be  all  the  more  strictly  governed  by  the  laws  of 
the  reasonable. 

In  an  address ^  of  singular  ability  on  "The  Dis- 
cord and  Harmony  between  Science  and  the  Bible," 
Dr.  Smith,  of  the  University  of  Virginia,  has  drawn 

1  "Creation."     By  Professor  Dana.     Oberlin,  O.     1885.   p.  202. 
«  New  York  :    Hatcham.     The  Address  is  dated  July  27, 1882. 


44  THE  CREA  TION  STOR  V. 

some  very  important  distinctions.  In  the  depart- 
ment of  natural  science,  and  in  the  department  of 
scriptural  record,  the  question  lies  "between  the 
present  interpretation  of  certain  parts  of  the  He- 
brew Scriptures,  and  the  present  interpretation  of 
certain  parts  of  nature."  ^  "  We  must  not  too 
hastily  assume  that  either  of  these  interpretations 
is  absolute  and  final."  "The  science  of  one  epoch 
is  to  a  large  extent  a  help,  which  the  science  of  the 
next  uses  and  abandons."  Dr.  Smith  points  out 
as  an  example  that,  down  to  the  early  part  of  the 
present  century,  Newton's  projectile  theory  of  light 
seemed  to  be  firmly  established,  but  that  it  has 
given  place  to  the  theory  of  undulation,  "which 
has  now  for  fifty  years  reigned  in  its  stead." 
Hence,  he  observes,  we  should  not  be  too  much 
elated  by  the  discovery  of  harmonies,  nor  should 
we  receive  with  impatience  the  assertion  of  contra- 
dictions. Throughout  it  is  probable,  and  not 
demonstrative,  evidence  with  which  we  are  dealing. 

1  New  York  :    Hatcham.     The  Address  is   dated  July   27,  1882. 
Page  3. 


THE  CREA  TION  STOR  Y.  45 

There  should  always  be  a  certain  element  of  reserve 
in  our  judgments  on  particulars;  yet  probable 
evidence  may  come  indefinitely  near  to  demon- 
stration; and,  even  as,  while  falling  greatly  short  of 
it,  it  may  morally  bind  us  to  action,  so  may  it,  on 
precisely  the  same  principles,  bind  us  to  belief. 
What  we  have  to  do  is  to  deal  with  the  evidence 
before  us  according  to  a  rational  appreciation  of  its 
force.  It  may  show  on  this  or  that  particular 
question  the  concord,  or  it  may  show  the  discord, 
between  alleged  facts  of  nature  and  alleged  inter- 
pretations of  Scripture ;  or  it  may  leave  the  ques- 
tion open  for  want  of  sufficient  evidence  either  way 
on  which  to  ground  a  conclusion. 

It  is  by  these  principles  and  under  these  limita- 
tions that  I  desire  to  see  the  question  tried  in  the 
terms  in  which  I  think  it  ought  to  be  stated; 
namely,  not  whether  the  recitals  in  Genesis  at  each 
and  every  point  have  an  accurately  scientific  form, 
but  whether  the  statements  of  the  Creation  Story, 
as  a  whole,  appear  to  stand  in  such  a  relation  to 
the  facts  of  natural  science,  so  far  as  they  have 


46  THE  CREA  TION  STOR  Y. 

been  ascertained,  as  to  warrant  or  require  our 
concluding  that  the  statements  have  proceeded, 
in  a  manner  above  the  ordinary  manner,  from 
the  Author  of  the  creation   itself^ 

Those  who  maintain  the  affirmative  of  this  propo- 
sition have  by  opponents  been  termed  Reconcilers; 
and  it  is  convenient,  in  a  controverted  matter,  to 
have  the  power  of  reference  by  a  single  word  to 
the  proposers  of  any  given  opinion.  The  same 
rule  of  convenience  may  perhaps  justify  me  in 
designating  those  who  would  assert  the  negative 
by  the  name  of  Contradictionists.  The  recorder 
of  the  Creation  Story  in  Genesis  I  may  designate 
by  the  name  of  Moses  himself,  or  the  Mosaist,  or 
the  Mosaic  writer.  This  would  not  be  reasonable 
if  there  were  anything  extravagant  in  the  supposi- 
tion that  there    is    a   groundwork   of  fact  for  the 

1  See  the  attractive  paper  of  Professor  Pritchard,  in  his  "  Occasional 
Thoughts."  Murray.  1889.  He  says,  on  page  261,  "  I  cannot  accept 
the  Proem  as  being,  or  even  as  intended  to  be,  an  exact  and  scientific 
account  of  Creation,"  but  adds  that  it  "contains  within  it  elements  of 
that  same  sort  of  superhuman  aid  or  superintendence,  which  is  gene- 
rally miderstood  by  the  undefined  term  of  inspiration." 


THE  CREA  TION  STOR  Y.  47 

tradition  which  treats  Moses  as  the  author  of  the 
Pentateuch.  But  such  a  supposition,  in  whole  or 
in  part,  is  sustained  by  many  and  strongs  presump- 
tions;  and  I  bear  in  mind  that  Wellhausen,  in 
giving  Bleek's  "  Introduction  "  to  the  world,  stated 
it  as  his  opinion  that  there  is  a  strong  ]\Iosaic 
element  in  the  Pentateuch. 

It  does  not  seem  too  much  to  say  that  the  con- 
veyance of  scientific  instruction  as  such  would  not, 
under  the  circumstances  of  the  case,  be  a  reason- 
able object  for  the  Mosaic  writer  to  pursue;  for 
the  condition  of  primitive  man,  as  it  is  portrayed 
in  the  Book  of  Genesis,  did  not  require,  perhaps 
did  not  admit  of,  scientific  instruction.  On  the 
other  hand,  it  could  not  but  be  a  reasonable  object 
then  to  convey  to  the  mind  of  man,  such  as  he 
actually  was,  a  moral  lesson  drawn  from  and 
founded  on  that  picture,  that  assemblage  of  created 
objects,  which  was  before  his  eyes,  and  with  which 
he  lived  in  perpetual  contact.  We  have,  indeed,  to 
consider  both  what  lesson  it  would  be  most  rational 
to  convey,  and  by  what  method  it  would  be  most 


48  THE  CREA  TION  STOR  V. 

rational  to  stamp  it  as  a  living  lesson  on  the  mind 
by  which  it  was  to  be  received.  And  the  question 
finally  to  be  decided  is  not,  whether  according  to 
the  present  state  of  knowledge  the  recital  in  the 
Book  of  Genesis  is  at  each  several  point  either 
precise  or  complete.  It  may  here  be  general,  there 
particular ;  it  may  here  describe  a  continuous  pro- 
cess, and  it  may  there  make  large  omissions,  if  the 
things  omitted  were  either  absolutely  or  compara- 
tively immaterial  to  its  purpose;  it  may  be  careful 
of  the  actual  succession  in  time,  or  may  deviate 
from  it,  according  as  the  one  or  the  other  best 
subserved  the  general  and  principal  aim;  so  that 
the  true  question,  I  must  repeat,  is  no  more  than 
this:  Do  the  propositions  of  the  Creation  Story  in 
Genesis  appear  to  stand  in  such  a  relation  to  the 
facts  of  natural  science,  so  far  as  they  are  ascer- 
tained, as  to  warrant  or  require  our  concluding 
that  these  propositions  proceeded,  in  a  manner 
above  the  ordinary  manner,  from  the  Author  of 
the  visible  creation? 

What,  then,  may  we  conceive  to  have  been  the 


THE  CREA  TION  STOR  V.  49 

moral  and  spiritual  lessons  which  the  Mosaist  had 
to  communicate,  and  not  only  to  communicate,  but 
to  infuse  or  to  impress?  I  do  not  presume  to 
attempt  an  exhaustive  enumeration.  But  it  is  not 
difficult  to  specify  a  variety  of  purposes  which  the 
narrative  was  calculated  to  promote,  and  which 
were  of  great  and  obvious  value  for  the  education 
of  mankind. 

First,  it  was  fitted  to  teach  man  his  proper  place 
in  creation  in  relation  to  its  several  orders,  and 
thereby  to  prepare  at  least  for  the  formation  of  the 
idea  of  relative  duty,  as  between  man  and  other 
created  beings. 

Secondly,  it  presented  to  his  mind,  and  by  means 
of  detail  made  him  know  and  feel,  what  was  the 
beautiful  and  noble  home  that  he  inhabited,  and 
with  what  a  fatherly  and  tender  care  Providence 
had  prepared  it  for  him  to  dwell  in.  There  was  a 
picture  before  his  eyes.  That  picture  was  filled 
with  objects  of  nature,  animate  and  inanimate.  I 
say,  one  of  its  great  aims  may  have  been  to  make 
him  know  and  feel  by  means  of  detail ;    for  whole- 


50  THE  CREA  TION  STOR  K 

sale  teaching,  teaching  in  the  lump,  or  abstract 
teaching,  mostly  ineffective  even  now,  would  have 
been  wholly  futile  then.  It  was  needful  to  use  the 
simplest  phrases,  that  the  primitive  man  might 
receive  a  conception,  thoroughly  faithful  in  broad 
outline,  of  what  his  Maker  had  been  about  on  his 
behalf  So  the  Maker  condescends  to  partition  and 
set  out  his  work,  in  making  it  a  picture. 

But  he  proceeds  further  (and  this  is  the  climax) 
to  represent  himself  as  resting  after  it.  This  de- 
claration is  in  no  conflict  with  any  scientific  record. 
It,  however,  implies  a  license  in  the  use  of  language, 
which  for  its  boldness  was  never  exceeded  in  any 
interpretation,  reconciling  or  other,  which  has  been 
applied  to  any  part  of  the  text  of  Genesis.  But  it 
draws  its  ample  warrant  from  the  strong  educative 
lesson  that  is  to  be  learned  from  it ;  for  it  invests 
both  with  majesty  and  authority  the  doctrine  of  a 
day  of  rest,  which  was  of  the  highest  importance 
to  the  higher  and  inner  life  of  man,  and  which  the 
daily  cares  of  his  existence  were  but  too  likely,  as 
experience  proved,  to  efface  from  his  recollection. 


THE  CREA  TION  STOR  V.  5  I 

I  contend  then,  thirdly,  that  the  Creation  Story 
was  intended  to  have  a  special  bearing  on  the 
great  institution  of  the  day  of  rest,  or  Sabbath,  by 
exhibiting  it  in  the  manner  of  an  object  lesson. 
Paley,  indeed,  has  said  that  God  blessed  the  seventh 
day  and  sanctified  it  (Gen.  2  :  3),  not  at  that  time, 
but  for  that  reason.  He  is  a  writer  much  to  be 
respected,  for  many  reasons ;  but,  in  dealing  with 
Holy  Scripture,  he  was  somewhat  apt  to  rest  upon 
the  surface.  And  now  we  have  learned  from 
Assyrian  researches  how  many  and  how  sharply 
traced  are  the  vestiges,  long  anterior  to  the  delivery 
of  the  law,  of  some  early  institution  or  command, 
which  in  that  region  evidently  had  given  a  special 
sanctity  to  the  number  seven,  and,  in  particular,  to 
the  seventh  day. 

Man  then,  child-like  and  sinless,  had  to  receive  a 
lesson  which  was  capable  of  gradual  development, 
and  which  spoke  to  something  like  the  following 
effect.  It  has  not  been  by  a  slight  or  single  effort 
that  the  nature,  in  which  you  are  molded  has 
been  lifted  to  its  present  level ;    you  have  reached 


5  2  THE  CREA  TION  STOR  Y. 

it  by  steps  and  degrees,  and  by  a  plan  which, 
stated  in  rough  outline,  may  stir  your  faculties,  and 
help  them  onwards  to  the  truth  through  the  genial 
action  of  wonder,  delight,  and  gratitude.  This  was 
a  lesson,  as  it  seems  to  me,  perhaps  quite  large 
enough  for  the  primitive  man  on  the  facts  of 
creation,  and  one  which,  when  he  had  heard  and 
had  begun  to  digest  it,  might  well  be  followed  by  a 
rest  for  generations. 

And  it  further  seems  to  have  been  vital  to  the 
efficiency  of  this  lesson,  from  such  a  point  of  view, 
that  it  should  have  been  sharply  broken  up  into 
parts,  although  there  might  be  in  nature  nothing, 
at  any  precise  points  of  breakage  or  transition,  to 
correspond  physically  with  those  divisions.  They 
would  become  intelligible,  significant,  and  useful  on 
a  comparison  of  the  several  processes  in  their 
developed  state,  and  of  the  vast  and  measureless 
differences,  which  in  that  state  they  severally  pre- 
sent to  contemplation.  As,  when  a  series  of  scenes 
are  now  made  to  move  along  before  the  eye  of  a 
spectator,  his  attention  is  not  fixed  upon  the  joints 


THE  CREA  TION  S  TOR  Y.  53 

which  divide  them,  but  on  the  scenes  themselves, 
yet  the  joints  constitute  a  framework  as  it  were  for 
each,  and  the  idea  of  each  is  made  more  distinct 
and  Hvely  than  it  would  have  been  if,  without  any 
note  of  division,  they  had  run  into  one  another. 

There  is,  however,  another  purpose,  not  yet 
named  and  more  remote  yet,  perhaps  even  more 
vital,  which  appears  to  be  powerfully  served  by  the 
Creation  Story  of  the  Bible.  In  the  prehistoric 
time,  polytheism  was  very  largely  engendered  by 
national  distinctions,  rivalries,  and  amalgamations. 
By  a  ready  and  ingenious  compromise  each  people 
became  habituated  to  recognize  a  deity  all-sufficient 
for  its  own  wants,  but  unconcerned  with  those  of 
others.  In  the  course  of  time  and  of  successive 
change,  many  of  these  deities  might  find  themselves 
inducted  into  one  and  the  same  thearchy,  or  mytho- 
logical system,  such  as  that  of  Assyria  or  of 
Olympus,  and  sitting  there  side  by  side.  When 
this  happened,  the  polytheistic  idea  had  reached 
its  full  development.  But  the  road  to  it  lay  princi- 
pally through  the  erection  of  separate  thrones  each 


/ 


54  THE  CREA  TION  STOR  V. 

for  its  particular  national  organization,  and  through 
the  limits,  thus  imposed  upon  the  earlier  and  more 
proper  conception  of  a  Divine  Governor.  But 
where  the  Creation  Story  of  Genesis  was  received, 
the  door  was  effectually  closed  for  all  thinking  men 
against  these  coequal  and  purely  national  gods. 
And  how?  Because  the  God  of  Israel  was  the 
Maker  of  the  world,  and  of  all  the  nations  in  it. 
It  was  his  creation ;  and  its  inhabitants,  whether 
terrestrial  or  celestial,  were  his  creatures.  Thus 
the  narrative  in  this  great  chapter  was  nothing  less 
than  a  charter  o£^  monotheism  ;  and  though,  in 
Israelitish  practice,  Baal  and  Ashtoreth  might  find 
their  way  into  popular  worship,  and  spread  around 
them  an  infinity  of  corruption,  the  lines  of  the 
dogma  never  were  obscured,  and  the  standard  of 
authoritative  reform  still  lifted  up  its  head  to  heaven 
from  the  first  day  of  idolatry  to  the  last,  when,  in 
the  Exile,  it  was  finally  submerged.-^ 

How   effectually  and  vividly  this  great  idea  of 

1  For  the  further  elucidation  of  the  subject  of  this  paragraph  see 
the  Postscript  to  "The  Creation  Story." 


THE  CREA  TION  STOR  V.  5  5 

creation,  lost  or  dilapidated  elsewhere,  was  im- 
pressed upon  the  Hebrew  mind  we  may  perceive 
from  a  usage  in  the  Psalms,  to  which  I  do  not 
remember  a  parallel  in  the  classical  literature.  The 
lower  orders  of  animated  creatures  are  themselves 
placed  in  a  living  relation  to  the  Almighty.  "  The 
lions  roaring  after  their  prey,  do  seek  their  meat  from 
God.  .  .  .  These  all  wait  upon  thee  ;  that  thou  may- 
est  give  them  m.eat  in  due  season  "  (Psa.  104  :  2 1,  27). 
Nor  is  the  boldness  of  Hebrew  devotion  arrested 
at  this  point.  It  extends  to  the  inanimate  world. 
"  The  heavens  declare  the  glory  of  God ;  and  the 
firmament  showeth  his  handiwork.  .  .  .  Their  sound 
is  gone  out  into  all  lands,  and  their  words  into 
the  ends  of  the  world.  .  .  .  The  sun  cometh  forth 
as  a  bridegroom  out  of  his  chamber,  and  rejoiceth 
as  a  giant  to  run  his  course  "  (Psa.  19  :  1-5).  This 
is  without  doubt  noble  poetry,  but  it  is  also  nobler 
than  any  poetry.  Mute  Nature  is  instinct  and 
vocal  with  worship,  and  Creation  in  its  humblest 
orders,  giving  a  lesson  to  its  loftiest,  ministers  to 
the  glory  of  the  Most  High. 


56  THE  CREA  TION  STOR  K 

In  order,  then,  to  approach  any  attempt  at  com- 
parison between  the  record  of  Scripture  and  the 
record  of  natural  science,  we  must  consider  first,  as 
far  as  reasonable  presumption  carries  us,  what  is 
the  proper  object  of  the  scientist,  and  what  was  the 
proper  object  of  Moses,  or  of  the  Mosaic  writer,  in 
the  first  chapter  of  Genesis.  \/ 

The  object  of  the  scientist  is  simply  to  state  the 
facts  of  nature  in  the  cosmogony  as  and  so  far  as 
he  can  find  them.  The  object  of  the  Mosaic  writer 
is  broadly  distinct;  it  is,  surely,  to  convey  moral 
and  spiritual  training.  This  training  was  to  be 
conveyed  to  human  beings  of  child-like  tempera- 
ment and  of  unimproved  understanding.  It  was 
his  business  to  use  those  words  which  would  best 
convey  the  lessons  he  had  to  teach;  which  would 
carry  mos^  truth  into  the  minds  of  those  he  taught. 
This  observation  has  not  the  honors  of  originality. 
"  He  emphasized,"  says  Rabbi  Grossmann,^  in  his 
interesting  tract  on  Maimonides,  "  as  very  proper 
and   wise,  the  Talmudic   maxim,  that  the  Torah 

*  Page  12.     Putnam,  New  York  and  London.     1890. 


THE  CREA  TION  STOR  V.  5  7 

employs  such  diction  as  is  likely  to  be  most 
communicative."  ^ 

In  speaking  of  the  Mosaic  writer,  I  would,  with- 
out presumption,  seek  to  include  any  divine  impulse 
which  may  have  prompted  him,  or  may  have  dic- 
tated any  communication  from  God  to  man,  in 
whatever  form  it  may  have  been  conveyed.  With 
this  aim  in  view,  words  of  figure,  though  literally 
untrue,  might  carry  more  truth  home  than  words  of 
fact ;  and  words  less  exact  will  even  now  often  carry 
more  truth  than  words  superior  in  exactness.  The 
truth  to  be  conveyed  was,  indeed,  in  its  basis  physi- 
cal ;  but  it  was  to  serve  moral  and  spiritual  ends, 
and  accordingly  by  these  ends  the  method  of  its 
conveyance  behooved  to  be  shaped  and  pictured. 

I  submit,  then,  that  the  days  of  creation  are 
neither  the  solar  days  of  twenty-four  hours,  nor 
are  they  the  geological  periods  which  the  geologist 
himself  is  compelled  popularly,  and  in  a  manner 
utterly  remote  from  precision,  to  describe  as  mil- 
lions upon  millions  of  years.  To  use  such  language 
as  this  is  simply  to  tell  us  that  we  have  no  means 


5  8  THE  CREA  TION  STOR  V. 

of  forming  a  determinate  idea  upon  the  subject  of 
the  geologic  periods.  I  set  aside  both  these  inter- 
pretations, as  I  do  not  think  the  Mosaist  intended 
to  convey  an  idea  Hke  the  first,  which  was  false,  oi* 
like  the  second,  which  for  his  auditory  would  have 
been  barren  and  unmeaning.  Unmeaning,  and  even 
confusing  in  the  highest  degree  ;  for  large  state- 
ments in  figures  are  well  known  to  be  utterly  be- 
yond comprehension  for  man  at  an  early  intellectual 
stage;  and  I  have  myself,  I  think,  shown  ^  that,  even 
among  the  Achaian  or  Homeric  Greeks,  the  limits 
of  numerical  comprehension  were  extremely  nar- 
row, and  all  large  numbers  were  used,  so  to  speak, 
at  a  venture. 

It  seems  to  me  that  the  "  days  "  of  the  Mosaist 
are  more  properly  to   be   described  as  chapters 

IN    THE     HISTORY     OF     THE    CREATION.       That     is    tO 

say,  the  purpose  of  the  writer,  in  speaking  of  the 
days,  was  the  same  as  the  purpose  of  the  his- 
torian is  when  he  divides  his  work  into  chapters. 

1  "  Studies  on  Homer  and  the  Homeric  Age."   Vol.  III.,  section  on 
Number. 


THE  CREA  TION  STOR  V.  $9 

His  object  is  to  give  clear  and  sound  instruction. 
So  that  he  can  do  this,  and  in  order  that  he  may 
do  it,  the  periods  of  time  assigned  to  each  chapter 
are  longer  or  shorter  according  as  the  one  or  the 
other  may  minister  to  better  comprehension  of  his 
subject  by  his  readers.  Further,  in  point  of 
chronology,  his  chapters  often  overlap.  He  finds 
it  needful,  always  keeping  his  end  in  view,  to  pur- 
sue some  narrative  to  its  close,  and  then,  stepping 
backwards,  to  take  up  some  other  series  of  facts, 
although  their  exordium  dated  at  a  period  of  time 
which  he  has  already  traversed.  The  resources  of 
the  literary  art,  aided  for  the  last  four  centuries  by 
printing,  enable  the  modern  writer  to  confront 
more  easily  these  difficulties  of  arrangement,  and  so 
to  present  the  material  to  his  reader's  eye,  in  text 
or  margin,  as  to  place  the  texture  of  his  chronology 
in  harmony  with  the  texture  of  the  action  he  has  to 
relate.  The  Mosaist,  in  his  endeavor  to  expound 
the  ordinary  development  of  the  visible  world, 
had  no  such  resources.  His  expedient  was  to  lay 
hold  on  that  which,  to  the  mind  of  his  time,  was 


6o  THE  CREA  TION  STOR  V. 

the  best  example  of  complete  and  orderly  division. 
This  was  the  day ;  an  idea  at  once  simple,  definite, 
and  familiar.  As  one  day  is  divided  from  another, 
not  by  any  change  visible  to  the  eye  at  a  given 
moment,  yet  effectually,  by  the  broad  chasm  of  the 
intervening  night;  so  were  the  stages  of  the  creative 
work  several  and  distinct,  even  if,  like  the  lapse 
of  time,  they  were  without  breach  of  continuity. 
Each  had  its  work,  each  had  the  beo^inningf  and 
the  completion  of  that  work,  even  as  the  day  is 
begun  by  its  morning,  and  completed  and  con- 
cluded by  its  evening. 

And  now  to  sum  up.  In  order  that  the  narra- 
tive might  be  intelligible,  it  was  useful  to  subdivide 
the  work.  This  could  most  effectively  be  done  by 
subdividing  it  into  periods  of  time.  And  further, 
it  was  well  to  choose  that  particular  circumscrip- 
tion or  period  of  time  which  is  the  most  definite 
and  best  understood.  Of  all  these  the  day  is 
clearly  the  best,  as  compared  with  the  month  or 
the  year, — first,  because  of  its  small  and  familiar 
compass;    and,  secondly,   because    of  the   strong 


THE  CREA  TION  STOR  K  6l 

and  marked  division  which  separates  one  day  from 
another. 

Hence,  we  may  reasonably  argue,  it  is  that  not 
here  only,  but  throughout  the  Scripture,  and  even 
down  to  the  present  time  in  familiar  human  speech, 
the  day  is  figuratively  used  to  describe  periods  of 
time,  perfectly  undefined  as  such,  but  defined,  for 
practical  purposes,  by  the  lives  or  events  to  which 
reference  is  made.  And  if  it  be  said  there  was  a 
danger  of  its  being  misunderstood  in  this  particular 
case,  the  answer  is  that  such  danger  of  misappre- 
hension attaches  in  various  degrees  to  all  use  of 
figurative  language;  but  figurative  language  is  still 
used.  And  with  reason,  because  the  mischiefs 
arising  from  such  danger  are  rare  and  trivial,  in 
comparison  with  the  force  and  clearness  which  it 
lends  to  truth  on  its  passage,  through  a  clouded 
atmosphere  of  folly,  indifference,  and  prejudice, 
into  the  mind  of  man.  In  this  particular  case  the 
danger  and  inconvenience  are  at  their  minimum, 
the  benefit  at  its  zenith;  for  no  moral  mischief 
ensues  because  some  have  supposed  the  days  of 


62  THE  CREA  TION  STOR  K 

the  creation  to  be  pure  solar  days  of  twenty-four 
hours,  while  the  benefit  has  been  that  the  grand 
conception  of  orderly  development,  and  ascent 
from  chaos  to  man,  became  among  the  Hebrew 
people  a  universal  and  familiar  truth,  of  which 
other  races  appear  to  have  lost  sight. 

I  may  now  part  from  the  important  and  long- 
vexed  discussion  on  the  Mosaic  days.  But  I  shall 
further  examine  the  general  question,  What  is  the 
true  method,  what  the  reasonable  spirit,  of  inter- 
pretation to  be  applied  to  the  words  of  the  Creation 
Story  ?  I  will  state  frankly  my  opinion  that,  in  this 
important  matter,  too  much  has  sometimes  been 
conceded,  in  modern  days,  to  the  scientist  and  to 
the  Hebraist,  just  as  in  former  days  too  much 
was  allowed  to  the  unproved  assumptions  of  the 
theologian.  Now  it  is  evident  that  the  proper 
ground  of  the  scientist  and  of  the  Hebraist  respec- 
tively is  unassailable  as  against  those  who  are 
neither  scientists  nor  Hebraists.  On  the  meaning 
of  the  words  used  in  the  Creation  Story  I,  as  an 
ignoramus,  have  only  to  accept  the  statements  of 


THE  CREA  TION  STOR  Y.  63 

Hebrew  scholars,  with  gratitude  for  the  aid  received; 
and  in  Hke  manner  those  of  men  skilled  in  natural 
science  on  the  nature  and  succession  of  the  orders 
of  being,  and  the  transitions  from  one  to  the  other. 
Not  that  their  statements  are  inerrable;  but  they 
constitute  the  best  working  material  in  our  posses- 
sion. Still  they  are  the  statements  of  men  whose 
title  to  speak  with  authority  is  confined  to  their 
special  province ;  and  if  we  allow  them  without 
protest  to  go  beyond  it,  and  still  to  claim  that 
authority,  when  they  are  what  is  called  at  school 
"  out  of  bounds,"  we  are  much  to  blame,  and  may 
suffer  for  our  carelessness. 

I  will  now  endeavor  to  illustrate  and  apply  what 
has  been  said.  The  Hebraist  says,  I  will  conduct 
you  safely  (as  far  as  the  case  allows)  to  the  mean- 
ing of  the  Hebrew  words.  And  the  scientist  makes 
the  same  promise  in  regard  to  the  facts  of  the 
created  orders,  so  far  as  they  are  exhibited  by 
geological  investigations  into  the  crust  of  the  earth. 
At  first  sight  it  may  seem  as  if  these  two  authorita- 
tive witnesses  must  cover  the  whole  ground,  each 


64  THE  CREA  TION  STOR  Y. 

setting  out  from  his  own  point  of  departure,  the 
two  then  meeting  in  the  midst,  and  leaving  no 
unoccupied  space  between  them.  But  my  con- 
tention is  that  there  is  a  ground  which  neither  of 
them  is  entitled  to  occupy  in  his  character  as  a 
specialist,  and  on  which  he  has  no  warrant  for  en- 
tering, except  in  so  far  as  he  is  a  just  observer  and 
reasoner  in  a  much  wider  field.  And  what  is  the 
residuary  subject-matter  still  to  be  disposed  of?  Not 
the  meaning  of  the  Hebrew  words.  The  Hebraist 
has  already  given  us  their  true  equivalents  in  Eng- 
lish. We  now  learn,  for  example,  that  the  *'  whales  " 
of  Genesis  1:21  are  not  whales  at  all,  but  that 
they  are  aquatic  monsters^  or  great  creatures;  while 
we  learn  from  the  biologist  that  the  whale  is  a  late 
mammal.  So  geology  has  acquainted  us  what  are 
the    relative    dates   of  the  water  and  of  the  land 

1  R.  v.,  the  great  sea-monsters.  "  It  seems,  on  the  whole,  most 
probable,  that  the  creatures  here  said  to  have  been  created  were 
serpents,  crocodiles,  and  other  huge  saurians,  though  possibly  any- 
large  monsters  of  sea  or  river  may  be  included  "  (Bp.  Browne  in  loc, 
"Speaker's  Commentary").  Possibly  a  word  meaning,  whether 
wholly  or  inter  a/m,  crocodiles,  would  convey  a  pietty  clear  idea  to 
the  mind  of  the  Hebrews,  after  their  sojourn  in  Egypt. 

5 


THE  CREA  TION  STOR  V.  65 

populations,  and  has  supplied  much  information  as 
to  reptiles,  birds,  and  beasts.  But  there  remains  a 
great  uncovered  ground,  and  a  great  unsolved  ques- 
tion. It  is  this.  Given  the  facts  as  the  geologist 
is  led  to  state  them,  given  the  Hebrew  tongue  as 
the  instrument  through  which  the  relator  has  to 
work,  what  are  the  terms,  and  wliat  is  the  order  and 
adjustment  of  terms,  through  which  he  can  convey 
most  of  truth  and  force,  with  least  of  encumbrance 
and  of  impediment,  to  the  mind  of  man,  in  the  con- 
dition in  which  he  had  to  deal  with  it?  Let  me  be 
permitted  to  say  that  the  only  specialism  which  can 
be  of  the  smallest  value  here  is  that  of  the  close 
observer  of  human  nature;  of  the  student  of  human 
action,  and  of  the  methods  which  Divine  Providence 
employs  in  the  conduct  of  its  dealings  with  men. 
Certainly  I  can  lay  no  claim  to  be  heard  here  more 
than  any  other  person.  Yet  will  I  say,  that  any 
man  whose  labor  and  duty  for  several  scores  of 
years  has  included  as  their  central  point  the  study 
of  the  means  of  making  himself  intelligible  to  the 
mass  of  men,  is,  pro  tanto^  perhaps  in  a  better  posi- 


66  THE  CREA  TION  STOR  V. 

tion  to  judge  what  would  be  the  forms  and 
methods  of  speech  proper  for  the  Mosaic  writer 
to  adopt,  than  the  most  perfect  Hebraist  as  such, 
or  the  most  consummate  votary  of  natural  sciences 
as  such. 

I  will  now  endeavor  to  try  some  portions  of  the 
case  which  turn  upon  verbal  difficulty.  At  the 
outset  of  the  narrative  the  relator  says,  that  "the 
earth  was  without  form,  and  void  "  (Gen.  i  :  2)  and 
that  "  the  spirit  of  God  moved  upon  the  lace  of  the 
waters."  Nay,  how  is  this  ?  says  the  Hebraist.  The 
Hebrew  word  for  "  earth  "  means  earth,  and  the 
word  used  for  "  water"  never  means  anything  except 
water.  But  according  to  the  beautiful  theoiy,  which 
has  during  the  last  half-century  won  so  largely  the 
adhesion  of  the  scientific  world,  and  which  seems 
to  be  mainly  called  the  nebular  theory,  at  the 
commencement  of  the  process  which  Genesis 
describes,  and  in  its  early  stages,  there  was  no 
earth,  and  there  were  no  waters.  Is  the  relator 
here  really  at  fault?  It  seems  to  me  that  it  might 
be  quite   as  easy  to  cavil  at  the  phrase  "nebular 


THE  CREA  TION  STOR  Y,  6/ 

theory,"  though  it  be  one  in  use  among  scientific 
men,  as  it  is  to  find  fault  with  these  words  of 
Genesis.  For  nothing  can  be  more  different  than 
a  nebula  or  cloud  from  a  vast  expanse  of  incandes- 
cent gaseous  matter.  In  truth,  we  seem  to  have 
for  our  point  of  departure  a  time  when  all  the 
elements  and  all  the  forces  of  the  visible  universe 
were  in  chaotic  mixture,  whereas  there  could  hardly 
be  any  sort  of  nebula  until  they  had  begun  to  be 
disengaged  from  one  another.  How  then  are 
we  to  judge  of  the  use  of  the  word  "earth"  by 
the  Mosaic  writer?  Is  it  not  thus?  He  is  dealing 
with  an  Adam,  or  with  a  primitive  race  of  men, 
who  have  the  earth  under  their  eyes.  He  wants 
to  give  them  an  idea  of  its  coming  into  existence. 
And  he  says  what  we  may  fairly  paraphrase  in  this 
way :  that  which  has  now  become  earth,  and  was 
then  becoming  earth,  the  solid  well-defined  form 
you  see,  was  as  yet  without  form,  and  void ;  epi- 
thets which  I  am  told  might  be  improved  upon, 
but  this  is  a  matter  by  the  way. 

So  again  with  respect  to  water.      The  men  for 


6s  THE  CREA  TION  STOR  Y. 

whom  the  relator  wrote  knew,  perhaps,  of  no  fluid 
except  water,  at  any  rate  of  none  vast  and  practi- 
cally measureless  in  volume.  What  was  the  idea 
he  had  to  convey  ?  It  was  not  the  special  and  dis- 
tinctive character  of  the  liquid  called  water;  it  was 
the  broad  separation  between  solid  as  such,  familiar, 
firm,  immovable  under  his  feet,  and  fluid  as  such, 
movable  and  fluctuating  at  large  in  space.  No 
doubt  the  idea  conveyed  by  the  word  "waters"  is 
an  imperfect  idea,  although  waters  are  still  waters 
at  times  when  they  may  be  holding  vast  quantities 
of  solid  in  solution.  But  it  was  an  idea  easy,  clear, 
and  familiar  up  to  the  point  of  expressing  forcibly 
the  contrast  between  the  ancient  state  of  things, 
with  its  weltering  waste,  and  the  recent  and  defined 
conditions  of  the  habitable  earth.  Could  we  ask 
of  the  relator  more  than  that  he  should  employ, 
among  the  words  at  his  disposal,  that  which  would 
come  nearest  to  conveying  a  true  idea?  And  had 
he  any  word  so  good  as  "water"  for  his  purpose, 
though  it  was  but  an  approximation  to  the  actual 
fact  ?     Dr.  Driver  describes  the  scene  as  that  of  a 


THE  CREA  TION  STOR  V.  6g 

"surging  chaos."  An  admirable  phrase,  I  make 
no  doubt,  for  our  modern  and  cultivated  minds; 
but  a  phrase  which,  in  my  judgment,  would  have 
left  the  pupils  of  the  Mosaic  writer  exactly  in  the 
condition  out  of  which  it  was  his  purpose  to  bring 
them;  namely,  a  state  of  utter  ignorance  and  total 
darkness,  with  possibly  a  little  ruffle  of  bewilder- 
ment to  boot.  Another  description  claiming  high 
authority  is,  an  "  uncompounded,  homogeneous, 
gaseous  condition  "  of  matter, — to  which  the  same 
observation  will  apply.  Even  now,  it  is  only  by 
rude  and  bald  approximations  that  the  practiced 
intellects  of  our  scientists  can  bring  home  to  us 
a  conception  of  the  actual  process  by  which  c/iaos 
passed  into  /cosmos,  or,  in  other  words,  confusion 
became  order,  medley  became  sequence,  seeming 
anarchy  became  majestic  law,  and  horror  softened 
into  beauty.  Before  censuring  the  Mosalst,  who 
had  to  deal  with  grown  children,  let  the  adverse 
critic  try  his  hand  upon  some  little  child.  I 
believe  he  will  find  that  the  method  and  language 
of  this  relator  are  not  only  good,  but  superlatively 


70  THE  CREA  TION  STOR  V. 

good,  for  the  aim  he  had  In  view,  if  once  for  all  we 
get  rid  of  standards  of  interpretation  other  than 
the  genuine  and  just  one,  which  tests  the  means 
employed  by  their  relation  to  the  end  contemplated 
and  sought. 

I  now  approach  a  larger  head  of  objection,  which 
is  usually  handled  by  the  Contradictionists  in  a 
tone  erf  confidence  rising  into  the  paean  of  triumph. 
But  let  me,  before  presuming  to  touch  on  objec- 
tions to  particulars  of  the  Creation  Story,  guard 
myself  against  being  supposed  to  put  forward  any 
portion  of  what  follows  as  unconditional  assertion, 
or  final  comment  on  the  text.  The  general  situa- 
tion is  this.  Objectors  do  not  hesitate  to  declare 
dogmatically  that  the  Great  Chapter  is  in  contra- 
diction with  the  laws  and  facts  of  nature,  and  that 
attempts  to  reconcile  them  are  futile  and  irrational. 
It  is  thus  sought  to  close  the  question.  My  aim  is 
to  show  that  the  question  is  not  closed,  and  that 
the  condemnation  pronounced  upon  the  Mosaist  is 
premature.  For  this  purpose  I  offer  conjecturally, 
and  in  absolute  submission  to  all  that  biology  and 


THE  CREA  TION  S  TOR  Y.  7 1 

geology,  or  other  forms  of  science,  have  established, 
replies  which  are  strictly  provisional;  but  replies 
which  I  consider  that  the  Contradictionist  ought, 
together  with  other  and  weightier  replies,  to  con- 
fute, or  legitimately  to  consider,  before  he  can  be 
warranted  in  asserting  the  contradiction.  But  I 
proceed. 

How  hopeless  is  the  cry  to  reconcile  Genesis 
with  fact,  when,  as  a  fact,  the  sun  is  the  source  of 
light,  and  yet,  in  Genesis,  light  is  the  work  of  the 
first  day,  and  vegetation  of  the  third,  while  sun, 
moon,  and  stars  appear  only  on  the  fourth!  Nay, 
worse  still.  Whereas  the  morning  and  the  evening 
depend  wholly  on  the  rotation  of  the  earth  upon 
its  own  axis  as  it  travels  round  the  sun,  the  Mosa- 
ist  is  so  ignorant  that  he  gives  us  not  days  only, 
but  the  mornings  and  the  evenings  of  days  before 
the  sun  is  created.  And  so  his  narration  explodes, 
not  by  blows  aimed  at  it  from  without,  but  by 
its  own  internal  self-contradictions.  It  is  hissed, 
like  a  blundering  witness,  out  of  court.  Not  that 
this  is  the  opinion  of  astronomers  in  general.     Mr. 


72  THE  CREA  TION  STOR  Y. 

Lockyer/  for  example,  cites  with  apparent  approval 
a  passage  from  his  very  distinguished  predecessor 
in  the  science,  Halley,  who  says  that  the  diffused 
lucid  medium  he  had  found  disposed  of  the  diffi- 
culty which  some  have  moved  against  the  descrip- 
tion Moses  gives  of  the  Creation,  alleging  that  light 
could  not  be  created  without  the  sun. 

The  first  triad  of  days,  says  Professor  Dana,^  sets 
forth  the  events  connected  with  the  inorganic  his- 
tory of  the  earth.  The  second  triad,  from  the  fourth 
day  to  the  sixth,  is  occupied  with  the  events  of  the 
organic  histoiy,  from  the  creation  of  the  first  animal 
to  man.  He  finds  in  the  general  structure  of  the 
narrative  a  considerable  degree  of  elaboration,  an 
arrangement  full  of  art.  The  passage  from  verse 
14  to  verse  19  Is  in  one  sense  a  qualification  of  the 
order  he  thinks  to  have  been  laid  down,  inasmuch 
as  the  heavenly  bodies  belong  to  the  inorganic 
division  of  the  history.  From  another  point  of 
view,  however,  this  arrangement  contributes  in  a 
marked  manner  to  the  symmetry  of  the  narrative. 

1  Nineteenth  Century,  Nov.,  1889,  p.  788.        2"  Creation,"  p.  207. 


THE  CREA  TION  STOR  Y.  73 

The  first  triad  of  days  begins  with  the  first  and 
gradual  detachment  of  Hght  from  the  "  surging 
chaos;"  the  second,  at  the  stage  in  which  Hght  has 
reached  its  final  distribution.  The  central  mass 
had  now  assumed  with  a  certain  amount  of  regu- 
larity (for  according  to  heliologists  the  process 
does  not  even  yet  appear  to  be  absolutely  com- 
pleted) its  spherical  and  luminous  figure,  after 
shedding  off  from  itself  the  minor  masses,  each  to 
find  for  itself  its  own  orbit  of  rotation.  Or,  if  we 
are  to  assume  that  the  photosphere  or  vapor  en- 
velope of  the  earth  itself  had  obstructed  the  vision 
of  the  sun,  we  have,  further,  to  assume^  that  this 
obstacle  had  now  disappeared,  and  the  visibility  of 
the  sun  was  established.  So  that  light,  or  the  light- 
power,  while  diffused,  ushers  in  the  first  division  of 
the  mighty  process  ;  the  same  light-power,  concen- 
trated by  the  operation  of  the  rotatory  principle,  and 
for  practical  purposes  become  such  as  we  now  know 
it,  is  placed  at  the  head  of  the  second  division,  the 
division  that  deals  with  organic  life. 

1  Guyot,  "  Creation,"  XI.,  p.  93. 


74  THE  CREA  TION  STOR  V. 

It  is  remarkable,  that  the  subject  of  Hght  Is  the 
only  one  which  is  dealt  with  in  two  separate  sec- 
tions of  the  narrative.  The  gradual  severance,  or 
disengagement,  of  the  earth  from  its  present  vesture, 
the  atmosphere,  and  of  the  solid  land  from  the  ocean, 
are  continuously  handled  in  verses  6-IO.  Each  of 
the  processes  is  summed  up  into  its  grand  result, 
as  if  it  had  been  a  violent,  convulsive,  instantaneous 
act.  The  avoidance  of  all  attempt  to  explain  the 
process  seems  to  me  only  a  proof  of  the  wisdom 
which  guided  the  formation  of  the  tale.  To  the 
primitive  man  it  would  have  become  a  barren 
puzzle;  the  wood  must  have  been  lost  in  the  trees. 
As  it  now  stands,  mental  confusion  is  avoided,  and 
definite  ideas  are  conveyed. 

There  seems,  however,  to  be  a  special  reason  for 
the  introduction  of  the  heavenly  bodies  at  this 
particular  place.  It  was  evidently  needful  at  some 
place  or  other  to  give  a  specific  account  of  the  day, 
or  compartment  of  time,  which  is  employed  to 
mark  the  severance  of  the  different  stages  of  crea- 
tion from  each  other.     At  what  point  of  the  narra- 


THE  CREA  TION  STOR  Y.  75 

tive  could  this  account  be  most  properly  ana  most 
accurately  introduced  ?  In  order  to  answer  this 
question,  let  us  consider  the  situation  rather  more 
at  large. 

The  supposition  is,  that  we  set  out  with  a  seeth- 
ing mass  that  contains  all  the  elements  which  are 
to  become  the  solids  and  liquids,  the  moist  and 
dry,  the  heat  and  the  non-heat  or  cold,  the  light 
and  the  non-light  or  darkness,  that  so  largely 
determine  the  external  conditions  of  our  present 
existence.  By  degrees,  as,  according  to  the  rarity 
or  density  of  parts,  the  centripetal  or  the  centrifu- 
gal force  prevails,  the  huge  bulk  of  the  sun  con- 
solidates itself  in  the  center,  and  aggregations  of 
matter  (rings,  according  to  Guyot,^  which  after- 
wards become,  or  may  become,  spheres),  are  de- 
tached from  it  to  form  the  planets,  under  the  agency 
of  the  same  mechanical  forces ;  all  or  some  of  them, 
in  their  turn,  dismissing  from  their  as  yet  ill-com- 
pacted surfaces  other  subaltern  masses  to  revolve 
around  them  as  satellites,  or  otherwise,  according  to 

1  "Creation,"  pp.  67,  73. 


76  THE  CREA  TION  STOR  Y. 

the  balance  of  forces,  to  take  their  course  in  space. 
Meantime,  the  great  cooling  process,  which  is  still  in 
progress  at  this  day,  has  begun.  It  proceeds  at  a 
rate  determined  for  it  by  its  particular  conditions, 
among  which  mass  and  motion  are  of  essential  con- 
sequence ;  for,  other  things  being  equal,  a  small 
body  will  cool  faster  and  a  large  body  will  cool 
slower ;  and  a  body  moving  more  rapidly  through 
space  of  a  lower  temperature  than  its  own  will  cool 
more  rapidly ;  while  one  which  is  stationary,  or 
more  nearly  stationary,  or  which  diffuses  heat  less 
rapidly  from  its  surface  into  the  colder  space,  will 
retain  a  high  temperature  longer.  Owing  to  these 
perhaps  with  other  causes,  the  temperature  of  the 
earth-surface  has  been  adapted  to  the  conditions  of 
human  life,  and  of  the  more  recent  animal  life,  for  a 
very  long  time;  to  those  of  the  earlier  animals,  and 
of  vegetation  in  its  different  orders,  for  we  know 
not  how  much  longer ;  while  the  sun,  though 
gradually  losing  some  part  of  his  stock  of  caloric, 
still  remains  at  a  temperature  inordinately  high, 
and  with  a  formation  comparatively  incomplete. 


THE  CREA  riGN  STOR  V.  77 

Considering,  then,  what  are  the  relations  between 
the  conditions  of  heat  and  those  of  moisture,  and 
how  the  coatings  of  vapor — ''the  swaddhng-band 
of  cloud  "  ^ — might  affect  the  visibility  of  bodies, 
may  it  not  be  rash  to  affirm  that  the  sun  is,  as  a 
definite  and  compact  body,  older  than  the  earth  ? 
or  that  it  is  so  old  ?  or  that  the  Mosaist  might  not 
properly  treat  the  visibility  of  the  sun,  in  its  present 
form,  as  best  marking  for  man  the  practical  incep- 
tion of  his  existence  ?  or  that,  with  heat,  light,  soil, 
and  moisture  ready  to  its  service,  primordial  vegeta- 
tion might  not  exist  on  the  surface  of  a  planet  like 
the  earth,  before  the  sun  had  fully  reached  his 
matured  condition  of  sufficiently  compact,  material, 
and  well-defined  figure,  and  of  visibility  to  the  eye? 
May  not,  once  for  all,  the  establishment  of  the 
relation  of  visibility  between  earth  and  sun  be  the 
most  suitable  point  for  the  relator  in  Genesis  to 
bring  the  two  into  connection?  And  here  again  I 
would  remind  the  reader  that  the  Mosaic  days  may 
be  chapters  in  a  history;  and  that, not  in  despite  of 

iDana,  "  Creation,"  p.  210. 


78  THE  CREA  TION  STOR  V. 

the  law  ol  series,  but  with  a  view  to  its  best  practi- 
cable application,  the  chapters  of  a  history  may 
overlap. 

The  priority  of  earth  to  sun,  as  given  in  the  nar- 
rative, carries  us  so  far  as  this,  that  vegetative  work 
(of  what  kind  I  shall  presently  inquire)  is  stated 
to  be  proceeding  on  the  surface  of  the  earth 
before  any  relation  of  earth  with  sun  is  declared. 
It  is  then  declared  in  the  terms,  "and  God  made 
two  great  lights  "  (v.  1 6).  Now  the  making  of  earth 
is  nowhere  declared,  but  only  implied.  And  who 
shall  say  that  there  is  some  one  exact  point  of  time 
in  the  continuous  process  which  (according  to  the 
nebular  theory)  reaches  from  the  first  beginning  of 
rotation  down  to  the  present  condition  of  the  solar 
system,  to  which  point,  and  to  which  alone,  the 
term  "making"  must  belong?  But,  unless  there 
be  such  a  point,  it  seems  very  difficult  to  convict 
the  Mosaic  writer  of  error  in  the  choice  he  has 
made  of  an  opportunity  for  introducing  the 
heavenly  bodies  into  his  narrative. 

I  suppose  that  no  apology  is  needed  for  his  men- 


THE  CREA  TION  STOR  V.  /9 

tioning  the  moon  and  the  stars  as  accessories  in 
the  train  of  the  sun,  and  combining  them  all  with- 
out note  of  time,  although  their  several  "makings" 
may  have  proceeded  at  different  speeds.  But  here 
again  we  find  exhibited  that  principle  of  relativity 
to  man  and  his  uses,  by  which  the  writer  in  Genesis 
appears  so  wisely  to  steer  his  course  throughout. 
We  are  told  of  "two  great  lights"  (v.  i6);  and  one 
of  them  is  the  moon.  The  formation  of  the  stars 
is  interjected  soon  after,  as  if  comparatively  insig- 
nificant. But  the  planet-stars  individually  are  in 
themselves  far  greater  and  more  significant  than  the 
moon,  which  is  denominated  a  great  light.  In  what 
sense  is  the  moon  a  great  light?  Only  in  virtue  of 
its  relation  to  us.  For  its  magnitude,  as  it  is  repre- 
sented on  the  human  retina,  is  far  larger  than  that 
of  the  stars,  approaching  that  of  the  sun ;  and  its 
office  also  makes  it  the  queen  of  the  nocturnal 
heaven.  So,  then,  the  general  upshot  is,  that  the 
mention  of  the  sun  is  introduced  at  that  point  in 
the  cosmogonic  process  when,  from  the  condition 
of  our  form  and  atmosphere,  or  of  his,  or  of  both, 


So  THE  CREATION  STORY. 

he  had  become  so  definite  and  visible  as  to  be 
finally  efficient  for  his  office  of  dividing  day  from 
day,  and  year  from  year;  that  the  planets,  being  of 
an  altogether  secondary  importance  to  us,  simply 
appear  as  his  attendant  company ;  and  that  to  the 
moon,  a  body  in  itself  comparatively  insignificant, 
is  awarded  a  rather  conspicuous  place,  which,  if  ob- 
jectively considered,  is  out  of  proportion,  but  which 
at  once  falls  into  line  when  we  acknowledge  rela- 
tivity as  the  basis  of  the  narrative,  by  reason  of  the 
great  importance  of  the  functions  which  this  satel- 
lite discharges  on  behalf  of  the  inhabitants  of  the 
earth. 

Next,  it  is  alleged  that  we  have  days  with  an 
evening  and  a  morning  before  we  have  a  sun  to 
supply  a  measure  of  time  for  them.  Doubtless 
there  could  be  no  approach  to  anything  like  an 
evening  and  a  morning,  so  long  as  light  was  uni- 
formly diffused.  But  under  the  nebular  theory, 
the  work  of  the  first  day  implies  an  initial  concen- 
tration of  light;  and,  from  the  timie  when  light 
began  to  be  thus  powei-fuUy  concentrated,  would 


THE  CREATION  STORY.  8 1 

there  not  be  an  evening  and  a  morning,  though 
imperfect,  for  any  revolving  soHd  of  the  system, 
according  as  it  might  be  turned  towards,  or  from, 
the  center  of  the  highest  luminosity? 

But  we  have  not  yet  emerged  from  the  net  of 
the  Contradictionist,  who  lays  hold  on  the  vegeta- 
tion verses  (vs.  1 1,  12)  to  impeach  the  credit  of  the 
Creation  Story.  The  objection  here  becomes  two- 
fold. First,  we  have  vegetation  anterior  to  the 
sun;  and  secondly,  this  is  not  merely  an  aquatic 
vegetation  for  the  support  of  aquatic  life,  nor 
merely  a  rude  and  primordial  vegetation  such  as 
that  of  and  before  the  coal-measures,  but  a  veg-eta- 
tion  complete  and  absolute,  including  fern-grass, 
then  the  herb  yielding  seed,  and  lastly  the  fruit- 
tree,  yielding  fruit  after  its  kind,  whose  seed  is 
in  itself  Here  is  the  food  of  mammals  and  even 
of  man  provided,  when  neither  of  them  was  created, 
or  was  even  about  to  exist  until  after  many  a  long 
antecedent  stage  of  lower  life  had  found  its  way 
into  creation  and  undertaken  its  office  there. 

First,  as  regards  vegetation  before  the  sun's  per- 
5 


82  THE  CREA  TION  STOR  V. 

formance  of  his  present  function  in  the  heavens  is 
announced.  There  were  light  and  heat,  atmos- 
phere with  its  conditions  of  moist  and  dry,  soil 
prepared  to  do  its  work  in  nutrition.  Can  there 
be  ground  for  saying  that,  with  such  provision 
made,  vegetation  could  not,  would  not,  take  place? 
Let  us,  for  argument's  sake,  suppose  that  the  sun 
could  now  recede  into  an  earlier  condition,  could  go 
back  by  some  few  stages  of  that  process  through 
which  he  became  our  sun;  his  material  less  com- 
pact, his  form  less  defined,  his  rays  more  inter- 
cepted by  the  **  swaddling-band"  of  cloud  and 
vapor.  Vegetation  might  be  modified  in  character, 
but  must  it  therefore  cease?  May  we  not  say  that 
a  far  more  violent  paradox  would  have  been  haz- 
arded, and  a  sounder  objection  would  have  lain, 
had  the  Mosaic  writer  failed  to  present  to  us  at 
least  an  initial  vegetation  before  the  era  at  Avhich 
the  sun  had  obtained  his  present  degree  of  definite- 
ness  in  spherical  form,  and  the  conditions  for  the 
transmission  of  his  rays  to  us  had  reached  sub- 
stantially their  present  state? 


THE  CREA  TION  STOR  V.  83 

But  then,  it  is  fairly  observed,  that  the  vegetation 
as  described  is  not  preparatory  and  initial,  but  full 
formed ;  also  that  any  tracing  of  vegetation  anterior 
to  animal  life  in  the  strata  is  ambiguous  and  obscure. 
In  the  age  of  protozoa,  the  earliest  living  creatures, 
the  indications  of  plants  are  not  determinable,  ac- 
cording to  the  high  authority  of  Sir  J.  W.  Dawson. 
It  is  observed  by  Canon  Driver  "that  the  proof 
from  science  of  the  existence  of  plants  before  ani- 
mals is  inferential  and  a  prioriy  ^  Guyot,  however, 
holds  a  directly  contraiy  opinion,  and  says  the 
present  remains  indicate  a  large  presence  of  infu- 
sorial protophytes  in  the  early  seas.^  But  suppose 
the  point  to  be  conceded.  Undoubtedly  all  a  priori 
assumptions  ought  in  inquiries  of  this  kind  to  be 
watched  with  the  utmost  vigilance  and  jealousy. 
Still  there  are  limits  beyond  which  vigilance  and 
jealousy  cannot  push  their  claims.  Is  there  any- 
thing strange  in  the  supposition  that  the  compara- 
tively delicate   composition   of  the   first  vegetable 

i"The  Cosmogony  of  Genesis,"  in  The  Expositor,  January,  1886, 
p.  29.  2  "  Creation,"  X.,  p.  90. 


84  THE  CREA  TION  STOR  V. 

structures  should  have  given  way,  and  become 
indiscernible  to  us,  amidst  the  shock  and  pressure 
of  firmer  and  more  durable  material?  The  flesh 
of  the  mammoth  has,  indeed,  been  preserved  to 
us,  and  eaten  by  dogs  in  our  own  time,  though 
coming  down  from  ages  which  we  have  no  means 
of  measuring;  but  then  it  was  not  exposed  to 
the  same  pressure,  and  it  subsisted  under  condi- 
tions of  temperature  which  wore  adequately  anti- 
septic. But  has  all  palaeozoic  life  been  ascertained 
by  its  flesh,  or  do  we  not  owe  our  knowledge  of 
many  among  the  earlier  forms  of  animated  life 
altogether  to  their  osseous  structures  ?  And,  in 
cases  where  only  bone  remains,  is  it  an  extravagant 
use  of  argument  a  priori  to  hold  that  there  must 
have  been  flesh  also?  And,  if  flesh,  why  should 
not  vegetable  matter  have  subsisted,  and  have 
disappeared  ?  Canon  Driver,  indeed,  observes  ^  that 
from  a  very  early  date  animals  preyed  upon  ani- 
mals. Still  the  first  animal  could  not  prey  upon 
himself;  there  must  have  been  vegetable  pabulum 

i"The  Cosmogony  of  Genesis,"  in  The  Expositor,  Jan.,  1886,  p.  29. 


THE  CREA  TION  STOR  K  85 

out  of  which  an  animal  body  was  first  developed. 
"Before  the  beasts,"  says  Sir  George  Stokes,  "came 
the  plants,  plants  which  are  necessary  for  their 
sustenance."  * 

Next,  with  respect  to  the  objection  that  the 
vegetation  of  the  eleventh  and  twelfth  verses  is  a 
perfected  vegetation,  and  that  there  existed  no  such 
vegetation  before  animal  life  began.  But  why  are 
we  to  suppose  that  the  Mosaic  writer  intended  to 
say  that  such  a  vegetation  did  exist  before  animal 
life  began  ?  For  no  other  reason  than  this  :  having 
mentioned  the  first  introduction  of  vegetable  life, 
he  carries  it  on,  without  breaking  his  narrative,  to 
its  completion.  In  so  proceeding,  he  does  exactly 
what  the  historian  does  when,  for  the  sake  of  clearer 
comprehension,  he  brings  one  series  of  events  from 
its  inception  to  its  close,  although  in  order  of  time 
the  beginning  only,  and  not  the  completion,  be- 
longs to  the  epoch  at  which  he  introduces  it. 
What  I  have  called  the  rule  of  relativity — the  inten- 
tion, namely,  to  be  intelligible  to  man — seems  to 

1  Letter  to  Mr,  Elflein,  August  14,  1883. 


S6  THE  CREA  TION  STOR  Y. 

show  the  reason  of  his  arrangement.  If  his  mean- 
ing was,  "the  beautiful  order  of  trees,  plants,  and 
grasses  which  you  see  around  you  had  its  first 
beginnings  in  the  era  when  living  creatures  were 
about  to  commence  their  movements  in  the  waters 
and  on  the  earth,  and  all  this  was  part  of  the  fatherly 
work  of  God  on  your  behalf" — such  meaning  was 
surely  well  expressed,  expressed  after  a  sound  and 
workmanlike  fashion,  in  the  text  of  the  Creation 
Story  as  it  stands. 

I  will  next  notice  the  objection  that  the  Mosaic 
writer  takes  (according  to  the  received  version)  no 
notice  of  the  great  age  of  reptiles,  but  proceeds  at 
once  from  the  creation  of  marine  animals  (v.  20)  to 
the  fowl  that  may  ''  fly  above  the  earth  in  the  open 
firmament  of  heaven."  He  thus  passes  over  with- 
out notice  the  amphibians,  the  reptiles  proper,  the 
insects,  and  the  marsupial  or  early  mammals,  on  his 
way  to  the  birds.  It  is  added  that  he  brackets  the 
birds  with  the  fishes,  and  thus  makes  them  of  the 
same  date. 

It  is  requisite  here   to   observe,  with   respect  to 


THE  CREATION  STORY.  8/ 

birds,  that  Professor  Dana^  writes  of  the  narrative 
in  Genesis  as  follows.  Speaking  of  the  relation 
between  the  Mosaic  narrative  and  the  ascertained 
facts  of  science,  he  uses  these  words  :  "The  accor- 
dance is  exact  with  the  succession  made  out  for  the 
earliest  species  of  these  grand  divisions,  if  we  except 
the  division  of  birds,  about  which  there  is  doubt." 

Owen,  however,  in  his  "  Palaeontology,"  ^  places 
animal  life  in  six  classes,  according  to  the  following 
order,  namely: — 

1.  Invertebrates.  4-  Birds. 

2.  Fishes.  5-  Mammals. 
3    Reptiles.                                     6.  Man. 

In  the  more  recent  "  Manual"  of  Professor  Prest- 
wich  (i886)  the  order  of  seniority  stands  as  follows: 

1.  Cryptogamous  Plants.  4.  Mammals. 

2.  Fishes.  5.  Man. 

3.  Birds. 

In  the  "Manual"^  of  Etheridge  we  are  supplied 
with  the  following  series,  after   fishes:     i.  Fossil 

1  "  Creation,"  as  before,  p.  215.  ^  Second  edition,  1861,  p.  5, 

3  Phillips's  "  Manual  of  Geology,"  Part  II.,  by  R.  Etheridge,  F.  R.  S., 
Chap.  XXV.,  pp.  511-520. 


88  THE  CREA  TION  STOR  V. 

reptiles.  2.  Ornithosauria;  ''flying  animals,  which 
combined  the  character  of  reptiles  with  those  of  birds'' 
3.  The  first  birds  of  the  secondary  rocks,  with 
"  feathers  in  all  respects  similar  to  those  of  existing 
birds."     4.  Mammals. 

It  thus  appears  that  much  turns  on  the  definition 
of  a  bird,  and  that,  in  this  point  as  in  others,  it  is 
hard,  on  the  evidence  thus  presented,  seriously  to 
impeach  the  character  of  the  Creation  Story. 
Largely  viewed,  the  place  of  birds,  as  an  order  in 
creation,  is  given  us  by  our  scientific  teachers,  or, 
as  I  have  shown,  by  many  and  recognized  authori- 
ties among  them,  between  fishes  and  the  class  of 
mammals.  It  is  a  gratuitous  assumption  that  the 
Mosaist  intends  to  assign  to  them  the  same  date  as 
fishes;  he  places  them  in  the  same  day,  but  then 
we  have  to  bear  in  mind  that  he  more  than  once 
gives  several  actions  to  the  same  day.  He  sets 
them  after  the  fishes;  and  the  faiicr  construction 
surely  is,  not  that  they  were  contemporaneous,  but 
that  they  were  subsequent.  He  forbears,  it  is  true, 
to  notice  amphibious  reptiles,  insects,  and  marsu- 


THE  CREA  TION  STOR  V.  Sg 

pials.  And  why?  All  these,  variously  important 
in  themselves,  fill  no  large  place,  some  of  them  no 
place  at  all,  in  the  view  and  in  the  concerns  of 
primitive  man ;  and,  having  man  for  his  object,  he 
forbears,  on  his  guiding  principle  of  relativity,  to 
encumber  his  narrative  with  them. 

If  it  be  true  that  the  demarcation  of  the  order  of 
birds  in  creation  is  less  sharply  drawn  than  that 
(for  example)  of  fishes  and  of  mammals,  may  we 
not  be  permitted  to  trace  a  singular  propriety  in 
the  diminution,  so  to  speak,  of  emphasis  with  which 
the  Mosaist  gives  to  their  introduction  a  more 
qualified  distinctness  of  outline,  by  simply  subjoin- 
ing them  (v.  20)  to  the  aquatic  creation. 

I  have  now  made  bold  to  touch  on  the  principal 
objections  popularly  known.  They  run  into  details 
which  it  has  not  been  possible  fully  to  notice,  but 
which  seem  to  be  without  force,  except  such  as  they 
derive  from  the  illegitimate  process  of  holding 
down  the  Mosaic  writer  in  his  narration,  so  short, 
so  simple,  so  sublime,  by  restraints  which  the  ordi- 
nary historian,  though   he   has  plenty  of  auxiliary 


90  THE  CREA  TION  STOR  V. 

expedients,  and  is  under  no  restraint  of  space,  finds 
himself  obliged  to  shake  off  if  he  wishes  to  be 
understood.  On  the  introduction  of  the  great  or 
recent  mammals,  and  of  man,  as  the  objector  is 
silent,  I  remain  silent  also. 

It  would  be  uncandid,  however,  not  to  notice  the 
"creeping  thing"  of  verses  24,  25,  and  26.  In 
these  verses  the  "creeping  thing"  is  distinguished 
from  cattle,  and  undoubtedly  appears  upon  the 
scene  as  if  it  were  a  formation  wholly  new.  If  the 
Mosaist  really  intended  to  convey  that  this  was 
the  first  appearance  of  the  creeping  thing  in  crea- 
tion, there  is,  I  suppose,  no  doubt  that  he  is  at 
war  with  the  firmly  established  witness  of  natural 
science.  Guyot,  indeed,  says  ^  that  these  creeping 
things  are  not  reptiles,  but  are  the  smaller  mam- 
mals, rats,  mice,  and  the  like.  If,  however,  the 
common  rendering  be  maintained,  it  may  be  just 
worth  while  to  suggest  a  possible  explanation.  It 
is  as  follows.  These  creeping  things  were  a  very 
minor  fact  in  the  scheme  of  creation,  so  that  the 

1  "Creation,"  p.  120. 


THE  CREA  TION  STOR  V.  9 1 

purpose  of  the  relator,  and  the  comparative  impor- 
tance of  the  facts,  may  here,  as  elsewhere,  govern 
his  mode  of  handling  them.  It  is  fit  to  be  observed 
that  he  never  mentions  insects  at  all,  as  if  they 
were  too  insignificant  to  find  a  place  among  the 
larger  items  of  his  account;  as  if  he  advisedly 
selected  his  materials,  and  sifted  off  the  less  im- 
portant among  them.  And  there  does  seem  to  be 
some  license  or  looseness  in  his  method  of  treating 
these  creeping  things;  for  while  he  severs  them 
from  fish,  fowl,  and  beast,  in  the  verses  I  have 
named,  and  again  in  verse  30  from  fowl  and  from 
beast,  yet  in  verse  28,  when  the  great  charter  of 
dominion  is  granted  to  man,  he  sums  up  in  three 
divisions  only,  and  makes  man  the  lord  **over  the 
fish  of  the  sea,  and  over  the  fowl  of  the  air,  and 
over  every  living  thing  that  moveth  upon  the 
earth."  Reptiles  appear  to  have  passed  out  of  his 
view,  either  wholly,  or  so  far  as  not  to  deserve 
separate  mention  ;  and  it  may  seem  likely  that  he 
did  not  think  their  importance  such  as  to  call  for  a 
particular  and  defined  place,  and,  while  according  to 


92  THE  CREA  TION  STOR  V. 

them  incidental  mention,  did  not  mean  to  give  them 
such  a  place  in  the  chronological  order  of  creation. 
Let  the  Contradictionist  make  the  most  he  can  out 
of  this  secondary  matter :  it  will  not  greatly  avail. 

If,  on  the  whole,  such  be  a  fair  statement  of  argu- 
ments and  results,  we  may  justly  render  our  thanks 
to  Dana,  Guyot,^  Dawson,  Stokes,  and  other  scien- 
tific authorities,  who  seem  to  find  no  cause  for  sup- 
porting the  broad  theory  of  contradiction.  I  am 
well  aware  of  m_y  inability  to  add  an  atom  of  weight 
to  their  judgments.  Yet  I  have  ventured  to  at- 
tempt applying  to  this  great  case  what  I  hold  to 
be  the  just  laws  of  a  narrative  intended  to  instruct 
and  to  persuade,  and  thus  finding  a  key  to  the  true 
construction  of  the  chapter.  For  myself,  I  cannot 
but  at  present  remain  before  and  above  all  things 
impressed  with  the  profound   and   marvelous  wis- 

1  In  the  Preface  to  Guyot's  "  Creation  "  will  be  found  some  account 
of  the  recent  literature  of  this  subject.  I  must  also  mention  a  valu- 
able pamphlet  entitled  "The  Higher  Criticism,"  by  Mr.  Rust,  rector 
of  Westerfield,  Suffolk.  It  sets  forth  the  scope  of  the  negative  criti- 
cism at  large,  and  recommends  (p.  30)  to  "have  patience  for  a  while, 
and  wait  to  see  the  issue."  Similar  advice  has,  I  understand,  been 
given  in  the  recent  Charge  of  the  learned  Bishop  of  Oxford. 


THE  CREA  TION  STOR  V.  93 

dom  that  has  guided  the  human  instrument, 
whether  it  were  pen  or  tongue,  which  was  first 
commissioned  from  on  high,  to  hand  onwards 
for  our  admiration  and  instruction  this  wonderful, 
this  unparalleled  relation.  If  I  am  a  "  reconciler," 
I  shall  not  call  myself  a  mere  apologist,  for  I  aim 
at  a  positive,  not  merely  a  defensive  result,  and 
claim  that  my  reader  should  feel  how  true  it  is  that 
in  this  brief  relation  he  possesses  an  inestimable 
treasure.  And  I  submit  to  those  who  may  have 
closely  followed  my  remarks,  that  my  words  were 
not  wholly  idle  words,  when,  without  presuming  to 
lay  down  any  universal  and  inflexible  proposition, 
and  without  questioning  any  single  contention  of 
persons  specially  qualified,  I  said  that  the  true 
question  was  whether  the  words  of  the  Mosaic 
writer,  in  his  opening  chapter,  taken  as  a  whole,  do 
not  stand,  according  to  our  present  knowledge, 
in  such  a  relation  to  the  facts  of  nature  as  to 
warrant  and  require,  thus  far,  the  conclusion  that 
the  Ordainer  of  Nature,  and  the  Giver  or  Guide  of 
the  Creation  Story,  are  one  and  the  same. 


94  THE  CREATION  STORY. 

Postscript  to  the  Creation  Story. 
Mankind  have  traveled  not  by  one  but  by- 
several  roads  into  polytheism.  It  took  a  thou  sand 
years  from  the  institution  of  the  Mosaic  legislation 
to  place  the  chosen  people  in  a  state  of  security 
from  this  insidious  mischief  But  all  along  a  pow- 
erful apparatus  of  means  had  been  at  work,  which 
was  streno-thened  from  time  to  time  as  Divine 
Providence  saw  fit.  The  foundation,  however,  had 
been  laid  in  the  Creation  Story.  It  was  impossible 
for  those  who  received  it  either  to  travel  or  to  glide 
into  polytheism  by  either  of  the  widest  roads  then 
open,  the  system  of  Nature-worship,  and  the  deifi- 
cation of  heroes.  No  one  could  make  the  Sun  his 
God,  who  really  believed  that  there  was  a  God  who 
created  the  Sun.  Even  more  perhaps  was  it  need- 
ful that  the  line  should  be  clearly  and  sharply 
drawn  between  Deity  and  humanity,  and  that  a 
barrier  not  capable  of  being  surmounted  should 
exclude  kings  and  heroes  from  deification.  In  the 
Homeric  or  Olympian  system,  the  worship  of 
inanimate   nature   was    studiously   shut    out;    but 


THE  CREA  TION  S  TOR  V.  95 

the  beginnings  of  deification  are  visible  in  the 
case  of  Heracles,^  whose  very  self  (avrbq)  sits  at 
the  banquets  of  the  Immortals,  and  of  the  twin 
brothers,  Castor  and  Pollux,  who  live  and  die  on 
alternate  days,  and  who,  when  they  live,  receive 
honors  like  the  gods.  In  the  height  of  their  civili- 
zation the  Romans  set  up  their  living  emperors  as 
divinities.  But  neither  they  nor  the  Greeks  believed 
in  the  creation  of  man  by  the  Almighty.  The  old 
cosmogonies  of  the  heathen  placed  matter  and 
other  impersonal  entities  in  a  position  of  priority 
to  their  gods,  who  merely  take  their  turn  to  come 
upon  the  scene.  Only  (I  believe)  in  the  Hebrew 
story  is  the  Deity  anterior,  without  which  condition 
he  cannot  be  supreme. 

Besides  being  anterior,  he  is  separate.  Did  we 
find  in  the  pages  of  the  Old  Testament  a  story  of 
deification,  we  should  at  once  knoAv  it  to  be 
spurious,  because  in  contradiction,  alike  as  to 
letter  and  as  to  spirit,  of  the  entire  context. 

It  is,  I  hope    not  presumptuous  to  proceed  a 

lOd.  XL,  302-305. 


96  THE  CREA  TION  STOR  V. 

step  further  and  to  say  that  this  broad  and  effectual 
severance  was  necessary  not  only  for  the  Old 
dispensation,  but  for  the  New :  not  only  for  the 
exclusion  of  idolatry  in  all  its  forms,  but  for  the 
establishment  of  the  Incarnation.  A  marriage 
would  be  no  marriage,  unless  the  individuality  of 
the  parties  to  it  were  determinate  and  ineffaceable. 
The  Christian  dogma  of  the  two  natures  in  one 
Person  would  be  in  no  sense  distinctive,  if  it  had 
been  habitual  in  the  preparatory  dispensation,  as 
in  some  of  the  religions  outside  it,  for  man  properly 
so  called  to  pass  into  proper  deity.  Reunion  was 
to  be  effected  between  the  Almighty  and  his  prime 
earthly  creature  by  the  bridge  to  be  constructed 
over  that  flood,  the  flood  of  sin,  which  parted 
them ;  and,  to  sustain  that  bridge,  it  was  needful 
that  the  natures  to  be  brought  into  union  should 
stand  apart  like  piers  perfectly  defined,  each  on  its 
own  separate  and  solid  foundation.  And  the  firm 
foundations  of  those  piers  were  laid,  to  endure 
throughout  all  time,  by  the  great  Creation  Story. 


// 


Ill 


THE  OFFICE  AND  WORK  OF  THE  OLD 
TESTAMENT  IN  OUTLINE, 


We  may  often  hear  it  said  that  the  Old  Testa- 
ment is  an  introduction  to  the  New.  Much  more 
is  contained  in  these  words  than  an  irreflective 
recital  may  permit  us  to  grasp.  Yet  they  do  not 
seem  to  cover  the  whole  ground.  It  seems  neces- 
sary to  glance  first  at  the  conjoint  function  of  the  t\vo 
Testaments,  in  order  to  measure  fully  the  exalted 
mission  of  the  earlier.  As  the  heavens  cover  the 
earth  from  east  to  west,  so  the  Scripture  covers 
and  comprehends  the  whole  field  of  the  destiny  of 
man.  The  whole  field  is  possessed  by  its  moral  and 
potential  energy,  as  a  provision  enduring  to  the 
end  of  time.  But  it  is  marvelous  to  consider  how 
large  a  portion  of  it  lies  directly  within  the  domain 
of  the  Old  Testament.     The  interval  to  be  bridged 

7  97 


98  OFFICE  AND  WORK  OF  THE 

over  between  the  prophet  Malachi  and  the  Advent 
is  not  one  of  such  breadth  as  wholly  to  abolish  a 
continuity,  which  was  also  upheld  by  visible  in- 
stitutions divinely  ordained,  and  by  the  production 
of  certain  of  the  Psalms  themselves.  It  is  further 
narrowed  in  so  far  as  something  of  a  divine  afflatus 
is  to  be  found  in  the  books  which  form  the  Apoc- 
rypha, which  are  esteemed  by  a  large  division  of 
Christendom  to  be  actually  a  part  of  the  Sacred 
Canon,  and  which  in  the  Church  of  England 
have  a  place  of  special  .though  secondary  honor. 
At  the  more  remote  end  of  the  scale,  it  is  difficult 
to  name  a  date  for  the  beginning  of  the  Sacred 
Scriptures.  The  corroborative  legends  of  Assyria,^ 
ascertained  by  modern  research,  concerning  the 
Creation  and  the  Flood,  to  which  we  know  not 
what  further  additions  may  still  progressively  be 
made,  carry  us  up,^  it  may  be  roughly  said, 
"To  Xkv^  first  syllable  of  recorded  time." 

1  These  legends  will  be  separately  noticed  later  in  the  present  series 
of  essays. 

2  See  No.  VI.  of  this  series  for  the  ground  of  the  argument,  which, 
as  here  presented,  can  only  have  in  a  certain  measure  the  character, 
of  an  assumption. 


OLD  TESTAMENT  IN  OUTLINE.  99 

Historic  evidence  does  not  at  present  warrant  our 
carrying  backwards  the  probable  existence  of  the 
Adamic  race  for  more  than  some  such  epoch  as  from 
4,000  to  6,000  years  before  the  Advent  of  Christ. 
And  if,  as  appears  Hkely,  the  Creation  Story  has 
come  down  from  the  beginning,  and  the  Flood 
legend  is  also  contemporary,  the  Christian  may  feel 
a  lively  interest  in  observing  that,  during  by  far  the 
larger  portion  of  human  history,  the  refreshing 
rain  of  Divine  inspiration  has  descended,  with  com- 
paratively short  intervals,  from  heaven  upon  earth, 
and  the  records  of  it  have  been  collected  and  trans- 
mitted in  the  Sacred  Volume.  Apart  from  every 
question  of  literary  form  and  of  detail,  we  now 
trace  the  probable  origins  of  our  Sacred  Books 
far  back  beyond  Moses  and  his  time.  And  so  we 
have  a  marvelous  picture  presented  to  us,  not  only 
all-prevailing  for  the  imagination,  the  heart,  and  the 
conscience,  of  man,  but  also,  as  I  suppose,  quite 
unexampled  in  its  historical  appeal  to  the  human 
intelligence.  The  whole  human  record  is  covered 
and  bound  together  in  that  same  unwearied  and 


lOO  OFFICE  AND   WORK  OF  THE 

inviolable  continuity,  which  weaves  into  a  tissue  the 
six  Mosaic  days  of  gradually  developed  creation, 
and  fastens  them  on  at  the  hither  end  to  the 
gradually  advancing  stages  of  Adamic,  and,  in  due 
course,  of  subsequent  history. 

We  find  then  that,  apart  from  the  question  of 
moral  purity  and  elevation,  the  Scriptures  of  the 
Old  Testament  appear  to  be  distinguished  from 
the  sacred  books  possessed  by  various  nations 
in  several  vital  particulars.  They  deal  with  the 
Adamic  race  as  a  whole.  They  begin  with  the 
preparation  of  the  earth  for  the  habitation  and  use 
of  man.  They  then,  from  his  first  origin,  draw 
downwards  a  thread  of  properly  personal  history, 
with  notices,  most  remarkable  in  their  character,  but 
contracted  in  space,  of  divergent  families  of  men. 
This  thread  is  enlarged  into  a  web,  as  from  being 
personal,  the  narrative  becomes  national,  from  the 
Exodus  onwards;  and  eventually  it  includes  the 
whole  race  of  man.  Our  Scriptures  are  not  given 
once  for  all,  as  by  Confucius  or  Zoroaster  in  their 
respective  spheres.     They  do  not  deliver  a  mere 


OLD  TESTAMENT  IN  OUTLINE.  lOI 

code  of  morals  or  of  legislation,  but  their  character 
is  pre-eminently  historical,  while  they  purport  to 
disclose  a  close  and  continuing  superintendence 
from  on  High  over  human  affairs.  And  the  whole 
is  doubly  woven  into  one  formation.  First,  by  a 
chain  of  Divine  action,  and  of  human  instructors 
acting  under  Divine  authority,  which  is  sustained 
and  represented  by  national  institutions,  and  is 
never  broken  until  the  time  when  political  servitude, 
like  another  Egyptian  captivity,  has  become  the 
appointed  destiny  of  the  nation.  Secondly,  by  the 
Messianic  bond,  by  the  light  of  prophecy  shining 
in  a  dark  place,  and  directing  onwards  the  minds  of 
devout  men  to  the  '*  fulness  of  time"  and  the  birth 
of  the  wondrous  Child,  so  as  effectually  to  link 
the  older  sacred  books  to  the  dispensation  of  the 
Advent,  and  to  carry  forward  their  office,  through 
an  action  both  of  and  in  the  Church,  until  the 
final  day  of  doom.  May  it  not  boldly  be  asked, 
what  parallel  to  such  an  outline  as  this  can  be  sup- 
plied by  any  of  the  sacred  books  preserved  among 
any  other  of  the  races  of  the  world  ?     So  far,  then, 


I02  OFFICE  AND   WORK  OF  THE 

the  office  and  work  of  the  Old  Testament,  as  pre- 
sented to  us  by  its  own  contents,  is  without  a  com- 
peer among  the  old  religions.  It  deals  with  the 
case  of  man  as  a  whole.  It  covers  all  time.  It  is 
alike  adapted  to  every  race  and  region  of  the  earth. 
And  how,  according  to  the  purport  of  the  Old 
Testament,  may  that  case  best  be  summed  up?  In 
these  words :  it  is  a  history  first  of  sin,  and  next  of 
redemption. 

Our  Lord  has  emphatically  said,  "  They  that  be 
whole  need  not  a  physician,  but  they  that  are  sick ;" 
(Matt.  9  :  12),  and  this  saying  goes  to  the  root  of 
the  whole  matter.  Is  there,  or  is  there  not,  a 
deep  disease  in  the  world  which  overflows  it  like  a 
deluge,  and  submerges  in  a  great  degree  the  fruit- 
bearing  capacities  of  our  nature?  Are  we  as  a 
race  whole,  or  are  we  sick,  and  profoundly  sick  ? 

I  think  that  to  an  impartial  eye  and  to  a  thought- 
ful mind  it  must  seem  strange  that  there  should 
be  a  doubt  as  to  the  answer  to  be  given  to  this 
question.  It  seems  more  easy  to  comprehend  the 
mental  action  of  those  whom  the  picture  of  the 


OLD  TESTAMENT  IN  OUTLINE.  IO3 

actual  world,  as  it  is  unrolled  before  them,  tempts, 
by  its  misery,  guilt,  and  shame,  into  doubt  of  the 
being  of  God,  than  of  persons  who  can  view  that 
picture,  and  who  cannot  but  observe  the  dominant 
part  borne  by  man  in  determining  its  character, 
and  yet  can  make  it  a  subject  of  question  whether 
man  is  morally  diseased.  Veils  may  have  been 
cast  between  our  vision  and  the  truth  of  the  case 
by  the  relative  excellence  of  some  select  human 
spirits  ;  by  the  infinitely  varied  degrees  and  forms 
of  the  universal  malady ;  by  the  exaggerations  and 
the  narrownesses  of  outlying  schools  of  theology ; 
and  lastly  by  the  remarkable  circumstance,  that 
races,  above  all  the  extraordinarily  gifted  race  of 
the  ancient  Greeks,  have  lived  on  into  large  devel- 
opments of  art,  of  intellect,  and  of  material  power, 
without  creating  or  retaining  any  strong  conception 
of  moral  evil  under  the  only  aspect  which  reveals 
its  deeper  features ;  that  aspect,  namely,  which 
presents  it  to  the  mind  as  a  departure  from  the 
supreme  and  perfect  standard,  the  will  of  God. 
But    these    disguises    are    pierced    through    and 


104  OFFICE  AND  WORK  OF  THE 

through  by  ever  so  little  of  calm  reflection.  We 
can  conceive  how  generations,  blinded  by  long 
abuse  to  the  character  of  moral  evil,  could  well 
contrive  to  blink  and  pass  by  the  question.  But 
we,  who  inherit  the  Christian  tradition,  ethical  as 
well  as  dogmatic,  cannot,  I  think,  deny  the  preva- 
lence, perhaps  not  even  the  preponderance,  of 
moral  evil  in  the  world,  without  some  subtle  and 
preliminary  process  of  degeneracy  in  our  own 
habit  of  mind.  We  shall  find  that,  in  renouncing 
that  tradition,  we  return  to  a  conception  which 
admitted  to  be  evil  only  that  which  was  so  vio- 
lently in  conflict  with  the  comfort  of  human 
society  as  to  require  condemnation  and  repression 
by  its  self-preserving  laws.  The  gap  between  these 
two  conceptions,  the  one  of  disordered  nature,  the 
other  of  Divine  grace,  is  immeasurable. 

And  I  think  it  will  not  be  denied  that,  in 
describing  vividly  the  fact  of  sin  in  the  world,  the 
Scriptures  of  the  Old  Testament  proceed  upon 
lines  which  have  also  been  clearly  drawn  in  the 
general  consciousness   at   least   of   the   Christian 


OLD  TESTAMENT  IN  OUTLINE,  10^ 

ages.  This  sense  of  sin,  which  lies  like  a  black 
pall  over  the  entire  face  of  humanity,  has  been  all 
along  the  point  of  departure  for  every  preacher, 
writer,  and  thinker  within  the  Hebrew  or  the 
Christian  fold ;  and  it  is  the  gradual  and  palpable 
decline  of  it,  in  the  literature  and  society  of  to-day, 
that  is  the  darkest  among  all  the  signs  now  over- 
shadowing what  is  in  some  respects  the  bright  and 
hopeful  promise  of  the  future. 

Nor  can  any  one  who  believes  in  the  existence 
of  God,  wonder  that  sin  is  described  as  a  devia- 
tion from  the  order  of  nature,  as  a  foreign  element, 
not  belonging  to  the  original  creation  of  Divine 
design,  but  introduced  into  it  by  special  causes. 
At  this  point  we  come  to  what  is  known  as  the  Fall 
of  Man,  and  to  the  narration  of  that  fall  as  it  is 
given  in  the  Book  of  Genesis. 

Against  this  narration  the  negative  criticism  has 
been  actively  employed.  The  action  ascribed  to 
the  serpent  is  declared  to  be  incredible ;  the  punish- 
ment of  Adam,  disproportioned  to  the  offense, 
which  consisted  only  in  an  action  not  essentially 


Io6  OFFICE  AND  WORK  OF  THE 

immoral ;  the  punishment  of  all  mankind,  for  the 
fault  of  one,  intolerably  unjust. 

Now  let  us  set  entirely  aside,  for  the  moment, 
the  form  of  this  narrative  and  consider  only  its 
substance.  Let  us  deal  with  it  as  if  it  were  a  par- 
able, in  which  the  severance  between  the  form  and 
the  substance  is  acknowledged  and  familiar.  In 
proposing  this,  I  do  not  mean  to  make  on  my  own 
part  any  definitive  surrender  of  the  form  as  it  stands, 
or  any  admission  adverse  to  it.  There  is,  it  may 
be,  high  and  early  Christian  authority  even  for 
surrendering  the  form.  I  only  seek  to  pass  within 
it,  and  to  put  the  meaning  and  substance  of  it 
upon  their  trial. 

In  this  relation,  we  find  a  certain  aggregate  of 
objects,  which  we  are  now  to  treat  as  if  they  were 
simply  significant  figures.  There  are  presented  to 
us  the  man  with  the  woman  in  a  garden ;  the 
serpent,  with  its  faculty  of  speech ;  the  two  trees, 
of  knowledge  and  of  life  respectively ;  a  fruit  for- 
bidden by  Divine  command,  but  eaten  in  defiance 
of  it ;    and,  after  certain  reproofs  and  intimations, 


OLD  TESTAMENT  IN  O  UTLINE.  1 07 

ejectment   from   the   garden    in  consequence.     In 
this    ejectment   is    involved   a    great   deterioration 
of  outward  state.     But  it  is  not  a  matter  of  out- 
ward state  alone.    A  deterioration  of  inward  nature 
is  also  exhibited,  in  the  derangement  of  its  func- 
tions.    A  new  sense  of  shame  bears  witness  to  the 
revolt^  of  its  lower  against  its  higher  elements,  and 
for  the  first  time  exhibits  it  to  us  as  a  disordered, 
and  therefore  a  dishonored  thing.     Together  with 
all  this  there  is  the  outline  of  a  promise  that  from 
among  the  progeny  of  the  fallen  pair  a  Deliverer, 
born  of  woman,  shall  arise,  who,  at  the  cost  of  per- 
sonal suffering,  shall  strike  at  the  very  seat  of  life 
in  the  living  emblem  of  evil,  and  so  shall  destroy 
its  power.     In  this  relation,  on  the  one  hand,  many 
modern   objectors   have  discovered  an   intolerable 
folly,  and,  on  the  other,  the  Christian  tradition  of 

iSee  Delitzsch,  who,  in  accordance  with  patristic  authorities,  writes 
as  follows  :  "  The  first  consequence  of  the  fall  was  shame.  The 
nakedness  of  mankind  is  no  longer  the  appearance  of  their  innocence. 
Their  corporeity  has  fallen  from  the  dominion  of  the  spirit.  Their 
beholding  has  become  a  sensuous  imagining,  and  the  flesh  excites 
their  fleshly  passions"  ("Old  Testament  History  of  Redemption," 
p.  23.     Edinburgh  :  Clark.     1881). 


I08  OFFICE  AND  WORK  OF  THE 

eighteen  centuries  has  acknowledged  a  profound 
philosophy,  and  a  painful  and  faithful  delineation 
of  an  indisputable  truth. 

Now  what  is  the  substance  conveyed  under  this 
form  ?  The  Almighty  has  brought  into  existence 
a  pair  of  human  beings.  He  has  laid  upon  them  a 
law  of  obedience,  not  to  a  Decalogue  or  code  set- 
ting forth  things  essentially  good,  and  the  reverse 
of  them,  but  simply  to  a  rule  of  feeding  and  not 
feeding.  The  point  at  which  this  representation 
first  brings  into  view  an  independent  or  objective 
law  lies  in  the  prohibition  to  feed  upon  a  tree 
which  imparts  the  knowledge  of  good  and  evil. 
That  is  to  say,  the  pair,  as  they  then  were,  were 
forbidden  to  aspire  to  the  possession  of  that  knowl- 
edge.    It  was  a  dispensation  of  pure  obedience. 

The  question  whether  this  was  reasonable  or 
unreasonable  cannot  be  answered  upon  abstract 
grounds,  but  resolves  itself  into  another  question, 
whether  it  was  appropriate  or  inappropriate  to  the 
state  of  the  beings  thus  addressed,  and  to  their 
relation   towards   Him  who   gave  the   command. 


OLD  TESTAMENT  IN  OUTLINE,  IO9 

Some  may  assume  that  Adam  was  what  so  great 
a  writer  as  Milton  has  represented  him  to  be — 

"  For  contemplation  he  and  valor  formed,"  * 

and  not  for  contemplation  only,  but  for  intricate 
inquiry  and  debate  on  subjects  such  as  tax  all  the 
powers  of  a  cultivated  intellect.  And  indeed, 
if  we  take  the  developed  man,  such  as  w^e  know 
him  in  Christian  and  civilized  society,  it  seems  plain 
that  to  lay  down  for  him  a  law  of  life  which  did 
not  include  the  consideration  of  essential  good  and 
evil,  would  not  only  stunt  and  starve  his  faculties, 
but  would  shock  his  moral  sense. 

It  may  be  said  that  a  single  act  of  disobedience, 
even  after  full  warning,  could  not  so  deprave  a 
character  as  reasonably  to  entail  upon  the  offender 
a  total  change  of  condition.  But  I  would  observe 
that  the  school  of  critics  which  is  apt  to  take  this 
objection  is  the  very  school  which,  utterly  rejecting 
the  literal  form  of  the  narrative,  is  bound  to  look 
at  it  as  parable.     When  so  contemplated,  its  lesson 

1"  Paradise  Lost,"  IV.,  297. 


no  OFFICE  AND  WORK  OF  THE 

is  that  rebellion,  deliberate  and  wilful  (and  this  is 
nothing  less),  against  just  and  sovereign  authority, 
fundamentally  changes  for  the  worse  the  character 
of  the  rebel.  It  places  him  in  a  new  category  of 
motive  and  action,  in  which  the  repetition  of  the 
temptation  ordinarily  begets  the  repetition  of  the 
sin  ;  and  it  is  mercy,  not  cruelty,  which  meets  this 
deterioration  of  character,  not  with  a  final  and  judi- 
cial abandonment,  but  with  a  deterioration  and 
reduction  of  state,  such  as  to  teach  the  lesson  of 
retribution,  and  to  serve  as  an  emphatic  warning 
against  further  sin. 

Scripture  will  lie  before  us  in  a  true  perspective 
when  we  come  to  understand  that  everywhere  the 
will  of  God  is  in  accord  with  the  righteousness  of 
God,  and  that  what  is  promised  or  inflicted  by  com- 
mand is  also  promised  or  inflicted  by  self-acting 
consequence,  according  to  the  constitution  of  the 
nature  we  have  received.  Religion  and  philosophy 
thus  join  hands,  and  never  part  them.  When, 
therefore,  we  are  told  that  Adam  after  his  sin  was 
shut  out  from  Eden,  we  are  not  entitled  to  say,  how 


OLD  TESTAMENT  IN  OUTLINE.  1 1 1 

hard  that  he  could  not  be  allowed  to  return,  and 
then  perhaps  to  amend.  What  is  inflicted  as  penalty 
from  without  is  acted  and  suffered  in  character 
within.  Repentance  is  not  innocence ;  there  must 
be  a  remedial  process ;  and,  until  that  process  has 
been  faithfully  accomplished,  the  anterior  state  and 
habit  of  mind  cannot  be  resumed. 

I  do  not  argue  with  those  who  say  this  is  a  bad 
constitution  of  things,  under  which  sin  engenders 
sinfulness ;  some  better  one  might  surely  have  been 
devised.  This  is  to  say,  "  Had  I  been  in  the 
Creator's  place,  I  would  have  managed  the  business 
of  creation  better."  It  is  for  us  not  merely  as 
Christians,  but  as  men  of  sense,  to  eschew  specula- 
tions which  even  their  authors  must  see  to  be 
wholly  devoid  of  practical  effect,  and  to  assume  the 
great  moral  laws  and  constitution  of  our  nature  as 
ultimate  facts,  as  boundaries  which  it  is  futile  to 
attempt  to  overstep. 

To  my  mind,  then,  the  narrative  of  the  Fall  is  in 
accordance  with  the  laws  of  a  grand  and  compre- 
hensive philosophy,  and  the  objections  taken  to  it 


112  OFFICE  AND  WORK  OF  THE 

are  the  product  of  narrower  and  shallower  modes 
of  thought.  Introducing  us  to  Adamic  man  in  his 
first  stage  of  existence — a  stage  not  of  savagery  but 
of  childhood — it  exhibits  to  us  the  gigantic  drama 
of  his  evolution  in  its  opening.  In  the  Paradise  of 
the  Book  of  Genesis,  it  reduces  to  a  practical  form 
the  noble  legend  of  the  Golden  Age,  cherished 
especially  in  prehistoric  Greece.  It  wisely  teaches 
us  to  look  to  misused  free-will  as  the  source  of  all 
the  sin,  and  mainly  of  the  accompanying  misery, 
which  still  overflow  the  world,  and  environ  human 
life  like  a  moral  deluge.  It  shows  us  man  in  his 
childhood,  no  less  responsible  for  disobedience  to 
simple  command,  than  man  in  his  manhood  for 
contravention  of  those  laws  of  essential  right  and 
wrong,  which  remain  now  and  forever  clothed  with 
the  majesty  of  Divine  command.  It  teaches  us 
how  sin  begets  sin;  how  the  rebellion  of  the 
creature  against  the  Creator  was  at  once  followed 
by  the  rebellion  of  the  creature's  lower  appetites 
against  his  higher  mind  and  will.  It  impresses 
upon  us  that  sin  is  not  like  the  bird  lightly  flying 


OLD  TESTAMENT  IN  OUTLINE,  1 13 

past  us  in  the  air,  which  closes  on  it  as  it  goes,  and 
carries  no  trace  behind  it.  It  alters  for  the  worse 
the  very  being  of  the  man  that  acts  it,  and  leaves 
to  him  a  deteriorated  essence.  This  he  in  turn,  by 
the  inexorable  laws  of  his  constitution,  transmits 
to  his  descendants  ;  and  this  again  in  them  exhibits, 
variably,  yet  on  the  whole  with  clear  and  even  glar- 
ing demonstration,  the  evil  bias  which  it  has  re- 
ceived, and  which  it  retains  until  it  shall  be  happily 
corrected  and  renewed  by  those  remedial  means 
which  it  was  the  office  of  the  Old  Testament  to 
foreshadow  and  of  the  New  to  establish.  Every- 
where, then,  in  this  narrative,  we  find  that  it  is 
instinct  with  the  highest  principles  of  the  moral 
and  judicial  order. 

For  the  present  I  pass  by  the  Flood  (Gen.  6-8), 
and  the  Dispersion  (Gen.  10),  which  may  be  most 
conveniently  considered  in  connection  with  what  is 
termed  profane  history ;  and  I  touch  next  upon  the 
call  of  Abraham.  This  call  imports  the  selection 
of  a  peculiar  and  separate  family,  which  was  after- 
wards to  grow  into  a  people.     They  were  to  be  in 


114  OFFICE  AND  WORK  OF  THE 

a  special  degree  the  subjects  of  God's  care,  the 
guardians  of  his  Word,  and  the  vehicles  of  his 
promises.  Of  all  great  and  distinctive  chapters  in 
the  biblical  history  of  the  human  race  since  Para- 
dise, we  have  here  perhaps  the  greatest  and  the 
most  distinctive. 

The  selection  of  a  family  may  be  regarded  from 
many  points  of  view. 

When  sin  had  come  into  the  world,  it  developed 
itself  in  the  forms  of  infirmity,  and  of  apostasy : 
if  it  be  allowed  to  describe  rudely  by  their  general 
terms  the  form  of  character  which  distinguished  the 
race  of  Cain  from  the  race  of  Seth.  What  we  see 
of  the  former  is,  as  described  in  Genesis  4  :  16-24, 
its  rapid  advance,  and  apparently  its  marked  prece- 
dence, in  arts  and  powers.  It  disappears  entirely 
with  the  story  of  the  Flood  ;  and  we  are  left  to 
infer  that  it  may  have  had  a  principal  share  in 
calling  down  that  great  retribution  inflicted  upon 
revolt  from  God. 

After  the  Deluge,  in  the  time  of  Peleg,  fifth  from 
Noah,  selection  again  appears,  and  is  carried  down 


OLD   TESTAMENT  IN  OUTLINE.  1 1  5 

in  Genesis  1 1  to  Abraham,  from  whom  an  unbroken 
thread  runs  onward  into  the  period  when  the 
chosen  family   had  become  a  chosen  nation. 

This  choice  of  a  particular  family  or  race  may 
be  adv^antageously  contrasted  with  the  heathen 
method  of  selection  or  preference,  by  the  deification 
of  individuals.  Of  the  first,  it  is  obvious  that  it 
reached  o\-er  all  time ;  that  in  this  way  it  tended 
to  assert  the  unity  of  the  human  race ;  and  that  it 
was  never  exclusive,  as  it  always  (not  to  mention 
other  proofs)  invited  to  partake  of  its  benefits  the 
"  stranger "  with  whom  it  had  come  into  contact. 
The  rival  method  of  deification  broke  communion 
rather  than  established  it,  and  was  based  on  no 
rational  principle  of  choice.  It  was  corrupt  as 
well  as  arbitrary,  for  the  deified  were  not  the  best. 
But  what  I  would  here  chiefly  press  is,  that  the 
continuous  selection  of  a  family  was  a  bar  to  deifi- 
cation, because  deification  was  essentially  founded 
on  individualities ;  instead  of  that  headship  in 
series,  which  presented  to  humanity  as  its  chiefs  a 
lineage.     Of  this  eveiy  member  had  his  destiny  as 


Il6  OFFICE  AND  WORK  OF  THE 

it  were  locked  into  that  of  the  rest  by  an  essential 
parity.  This  kind  of  selection  did  not  favor  idola- 
try, like  the  other,  but  built  up  a  wall  against  it. 
And  so  it  came  about,  as  we  have  seen,  that,  even 
when  idolatry  invaded  and  possessed  the  people,  it 
never  tainted  the  religion. 

This  selection  of  Abraham  and  his  progeny,  if  we 
speak  after  the  manner  of  men,  we  might  perhaps 
describe  as  follows.  The  original  attempt  to  plant 
a  species  upon  our  planet,  which  should  be  endowed 
with  the  faculty  of  free-will,  but  should  always 
direct  that  will  to  good,  had  been  frustrated  through 
sin ;  and  the  tainted  progeny  had,  after  a  trial  of 
many  generations,  been  destroyed  by  the  Deluge. 
In  the  descendants  of  Noah,  man  was  renewed  upon 
a  far  larger  scale.  Different  branches  of  the  race 
(Gen.  lo)  were  sent,  or  were  allowed  to  go  forth, 
and  to  people  different  portions  of  the  earth,  each 
canying  with  them  different  gifts,  and  different 
vocations  according  to  those  gifts;  the  notes  of 
which,  in  various  prominent  cases,  we  cannot  fail 
to  discern  written  large  upon  the  page  of  history. 


OLD  TESTAMENT  IN  O  UTLINE.  1 1 7 

After  a  brief  period,  choice  was  made  not  of  a 
nation,  but  of  a  person,  namely,  Abraham,  who  with 
his  descendants  became  the  subject  of  a  special 
training.  They  lived,  according  to  the  record  in  the 
Bible,  not  like  other  men  generally,  dependent  upon 
the  exercise  of  their  natural  faculties  alone,  but  with 
the  advantage  from  time  to  time,  and  with  the 
continuing  responsibility,  of  supernatural  command 
and  visitation.  But  this  remarkable  promotion  to 
a  higher  form  of  life  did  not  invest  them  with  any 
arbitrary  or  selfish  prerogative.  On  the  contrary, 
as  the  legislation  of  Moses  was  distinguished  from 
other  ancient  codes  by  its  liberal  and  likewise  elabo- 
rate care  for  the  stranger;  so  also,  from  the  veiy 
outset,  and  before  the  family  could  blossom  into  the 
nation,  nay,  even  in  the  very  person  of  Abraham, 
the  gift  imparted  to  him  was  declared  to  be  given  for 
the  behoof  of  mankind  at  large.  "  In  thee  and  in 
thy  seed  shall  all  the  families  of  the  earth  be 
blessed"  (Gen.  28  :  14).  The  prerogative  of  the 
Jew  was  from  its  very  inception  bound  up  with  the 
future  elevation  of  the  Gentile. 


it8         office  and  work  of  the 

This  divine  election  doubtless  carried  with  it  the 
duty  and  the  means  of  reaching  a  higher  level  of 
moral  life  than  prevailed  among  the  surrounding 
Asiatic  nations.  These  nations,  sharing  with  the 
chosen  race  the  infirmity  and  deterioration  of 
nature,  differed  in  this,  that  they  at  once  carried  the 
reflection  of  their  own  sinfulness  into  their  creed 
respecting  the  unseen,  and  made  religion  itself  a 
direct  instrument  of  corruption.  Yet  those  whom 
we  call  the  patriarchs  were  not  exempted  from  the 
general  degeneracy  of  morals  ;  and  even  Abraham, 
the  general  strain  of  whose  life  appears  to  have  been 
so  simple  and  devout,  on  going  down  into  Egypt  to 
escape  from  famine,  exposed  his  wife  to  the  risk 
of  an  adulterous  connection  with  the  king  of  the 
country,  lest,  if  she  were  known  to  be  his  wife,  his 
personal  safety  should  be  compromised.  On  the 
moral  standing  of  the  nation  sprung  from  Abraham, 
as  compared  with  that  of  contemporary  races,  there 
will  be  more  to  say  hereafter.  Meantime,  it  may  be 
observed  that  the  sins  and  follies  of  the  favored 
race,  as  well  as  of  their  priests  and  rulers,  are-  told 


OLD  TESTAMENT  IN  OUTLINE.  II9 

in  the  narrative  frankly,  and  without  attempting  to 
excuse  them.  This  frankness  of  narration  extends 
also  to  the  calamities  which  befell  the  Israelites ; 
and,  as  an  evidence  of  the  integrity  of  the  Hebrew 
penmen,  it  suggests  a  presumption  that  such  plain 
speaking,  in  the  face  of  national  and  ancestral  self- 
love,  is,  to  say  the  least,  highly  in  accordance  with 
the  belief  that  the  record  generally  was  framed 
under  special  guidance  from  above. 

The  selection  of  Abraham  and  his  posterity  was 
at  the  least  a  boon  to  some,  a  privation  to  none. 
In  its  immediate  effect,  it  withdrew  nothing  from 
the  nations  outside  the  Hebrew  pale.  It  bestowed, 
indeed,  upon  the  parallel  line  of  Ishmael,  a  prefer- 
ential but  inferior  blessing,  which,  however,  it  is  no 
part  of  the  present  purpose  to  examine,  further  than 
to  say  that  the  Mohamme'dan  religion  may  be  re- 
garded, in  its  conflict  with  the  idolatry  which  it  first 
confronted,  and  in  the  present  day  among  the  tribes 
of  Western  Africa,  as  having  been,  if  not  perma- 
nently yet  for  a  time,  the  communication  of  a  rela- 
tive good.     And  the  Old  Testament  abounds  with 


I20  OFFICE  AND  WORK  OF  THE 

passages  which  demonstrate  the  care,  and  even  the 
special  care,  of  the  Almighty  for  nations  other  than 
the  Jews.^ 

But  the  object  which  now  demands  our  attention 
is  the  promise  of  a  blessing  in  and  by  the  seed  of 
Abraham  to  all  the  nations  of  the  earth.  The  first- 
fruits  of  this  blessing  may  be  said  to  have  been 
perceived  in  the  translation  of  the  books  of  the  Old 
Testament  into  Greek  during  the  third  century 
before  the  Advent.  At  the  time  when  the  language 
of  the  Greeks  was  maturing  its  supremacy,  in  the 
East  through  the  conquests  of  Alexander  the  Great, 
and  in  the  West  through  appreciation  by  the  Roman 
and  Italian  genius,  in  some  respects  allied  to  their 
own,  the  Greek  race  itself  was  on  its  decline,  both 
as  to  its  intellect  and  as  to  its  practical  energy. 
This  decline  may,  perhaps,  have  rendered  the 
world  more  receptive  of  the  influences,  which  the 
substance  of  the  Hebrew  books  was  calculated  to 
exercise. 

1  See,  for  example,  the  two  first  chapters  of  Amos,  and  the  whole 
book  of  Jonah. 


OLD  TESTAMENT  IN  0  UTLINE,  1 2 1 

There  can  hardly  be  a  doubt  that,  among  all  the 
forms  of  Hellenic  thought  exhibited  in  the  different 
schools  of  philosophy,  that  of  the  Stoics  was  the 
highest  in  respect  of  its  conception  of  the  Deity, 
of  its  emancipation  from  idolatry,  and  of  its 
capacity  of  moral  elevation.  In  the  hands  of 
Seneca,  of  Epictetus,  and  of  Marcus  Aurelius,  Stoic 
ideas  attained  so  high  a  level  as  to  have  been  used 
by  some  in  disparagement  of  the  exclusive  claim  of 
the  gospel  to  the  promulgation  of  truths  powerful 
enough  to  regenerate  the  world.  Without  assert- 
ing that  the  early  Stoics  derived  their  inspiration 
through  the  Greek  version,  called  the  Septuagint, 
from  the  Hebrew  Scriptures,  it  may  be  observed 
that,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  philosophy  rose  to  its  high- 
est level  through  the  Stoics  at  a  time  when  the 
Greek  mind  was  declining;  and  further,  that 
Stoicism  made  its  first  appearance,  and  began  its 
advance,  at  the  epoch  when  those  Scriptures  had 
become  accessible.  Also  it  arose  and  flourished, 
not  in  Greece  itself,  but  at  points  such  as  Citium, 
in  countries  such  as  Pontus,  in  schools  of  learning 


122  OFFICE  AND  WORK  OF  THE 

such  as  Alexandria,  which  were  seats  of  Jewish 
resort  and  influence/ 

It  was  an  advance  of  a  different  order  towards 
the  fulfihnent  of  the  Abrahamic  promises,  when 
the  Apostles,  charged  with  the  commission  of  our 
Lord,  went  forth  into  all  the  world,  and  preached 
the  gospel  to  every  creature  (Mark  i6  :  15). 
Then,  indeed,  an  enginery  was  set  at  work,  capable 
of  coping  with  the  whole  range  of  the  mischiefs 
brought  into  the  world  by  sin,  and  of  completely 
redeeming  the  human  being  from  its  effects,  and 
consecrating  our  nature  to  duty  and  to  God.  It  is 
impossible  here  to  do  so  much  as  even  to  skirt  this 
vast  subject.  But  at  once  these  three  things  may 
be  said  as  to  the  development,  through  the  gospel, 
of  the  Abrahamic  promise.     First,  that  in  the  vast 

1  See"  Encyclopaedia  Britannica."  9th  ed.  Art.  " Stoics."  It  states 
that  the  school  is  mainly  to  be  considered  "as  the  first-fruits  of  that 
interaction  between  West  and  East,  which  followed  the  conquests  of 
Alexander."  Zeno  was  of  Phoenician  descent ;  Cyprus,  Cilicid,  Syria, 
themaj  countries  of  its  origin.  Citium,  Alexandria.  HeracleainPontus, 
were  prominent  among  the  places  furnishing  and  rearing  its  teachers. 
Most  of  the  Stoics  were  from  lands  of  Hellenistic  (as  distinct  from 
Hellenic)  civilization.     It  was  the  growth  of  "  the  Hellenized  East." 


OLD  TESTAMENT  IN  OUTLINE.  123 

^gg^'^gate  of  genuine  believers,  the  recovery  of  the 
Divine  image  has  been  effectual,  and  the  main- 
spring of  their  being  has  been  set  right  before  their 
quitting  the  world,  by  the  dedication  of  the  will 
to  God.  Secondly,  that  the  social  results  of  the 
change  have  been  beneficial  and  immense  in  the 
restriction  of  wars,  in  the  abolition  of  horrible 
practices  publicly  sanctioned,  in  the  recognition  of 
essential  rights,  in  the  elevation  of  woman  (whose 
case  most  and  best  of  all  represents  the  case  of 
right  as  against  force),  in  the  mitigation  of  selfish 
and  cruel  laws,  in  the  refinement  of  manners ;  in 
the  utter  proscription  of  all  extreme  forms  of  sin; 
and  in  the  public  acknowledgment  of  standards 
of  action  nearer  to  the  true.  Thirdly,  that  Chris- 
tendom is  at  this  moment  undeniably  the  prime 
and  central  power  of  the  world,  and  still  bears, 
written  upon  its  front,  the  mission  to  subdue  it. 
In  point  of  force  and  onward  impulsion,  it  stands 
without  a  rival,  while  every  other  widely  spread 
religion  is  in  decline.  Critical,  indeed,  are  the 
movements  which  affect  it  from  within.     Vast  are 


124  OFFICE  AND   WORK  OF  THE 

the  deductions  which  on  every  side  are  to  be  made 
from  the  fulness  of  the  Divine  promises,  when 
we  try  to  measure  their  results  in  the  world  of 
facts.  Indefinitely  slow,  and  hard  to  trace  in  detail, 
as  may  be,  like  a  glacier  in  descent,  the  march  of 
the  times,  the  Christianity  of  to-day  has,  in  relation 
to  the  world  non-Christian,  an  amount  of  ascen- 
dency such  as  it  has  never  before  possessed ;  and, 
if  only  it  can  sufficiently  retain  its  inward  consis- 
tency, the  sole  remaining  question  seems  to  be  as 
to  the  time,  the  circumstances,  and  the  rate,  of  its 
further,  perhaps  of  its  final,  conquests. 

I  know  that  it  is  far  beyond  the  scope  of  a  few 
pages  such  as  these  to  make  good  in  detail  the 
claims  of  the  Abrahamic  promise.  Still,  I  think 
that  even  what  has  been  said  may  in  some  measure 
suffice  for  the  purpose  which  I  have  immediately  in 
view.  That  purpose  is  to  establish  in  outline  the 
strictly  exceptional  character  of  the  books  of  the 
Old  Testament;  and  with  this  aim  to  show  that 
they  bear  upon  them  the  stamp  of  a  comprehen- 
siveness  which    concerns,  which   penetrates,  nay, 


OLD  TESTAMENT  IN  OUTLINE.  12$ 

which  envelops,  the  history  of  the  world  as  a 
whole.  The  promise,  given  to  Abraham  nearly 
two  thousand  years  before  the  Advent,  finds  its 
correlative  marks  in  the  general  train  of  subse- 
quent history.  These  marks  demonstrate  that  it 
was  given  by  a  Divine  foreknowledge.  And  if  so, 
then  the  venerable  record  in  which  it  is  enshrined 
surely  seems  here,  at  least,  to  carry  the  seal  and 
signature  of  a  Divine  authorship. 

Now  let  us  consider  from  another  point  of  view 
the  selection  of  the  Hebrew  race,  and  the  peculiar 
standing  of  the  Mosaic  legislation,  so  intimately 
allied  with  the  whole  of  its  singularly  checkered 
fortunes.  And  in  order  to  effect  something  towards 
ascertaining  what  was  probably  the  cause  determin- 
ing the  Divine  selection  and  procedure,  we  may  do 
well  first  to  refer  to  some  aims  which  might  at  first 
sight  have  been  thought  probable  ;  such  as  to  pro- 
vide a  complete  theology,  or  such  as  to  reward 
with  honor,  wealth,  and  power  a  peculiarly  virtuous 
people,  whose  moral  conduct  was  to  be  of  a  nature 
likely  to  make  them  an   edifying   and   attractive 


1.26  OFFICE  AND  WORK  OF  THE 

example  to  the  nations  of  the  earth.  Human 
speculation  might  have  been  forward  to  anticipate 
that  one  or  both  of  these  aims  might  have  been 
contemplated  by  a  plan  so  exceptional  as  the 
selection  and  isolation  of  one  particular  line  and 
people.  But  the  facts  appear  to  show  that  any  such 
anticipation  would  have  been  entirely  mistaken. 

By  a  complete  theology,  I  mean  simply  such  a 
theology  as  would  confront  and  make  provision  for 
all  the  leading  facts  of  the  moral  situation.  Among 
these  a  prominent  place  had  from  the  date  of  the 
first  traditions  been  given  to  the  entrance  of  sin 
into  the  world,  and  to  the  promise  of  redemption 
from  its  power.  Now  it  is  evident  that  there  was 
no  attempt,  in  the  legislation  of  the  Pentateuch,  at 
this  theological  completeness.  Its  theology  is 
summed  up  in  clear  declarations  of  the  being  of 
God,  and  of  duty  and  love  to  him,  with  which  are 
directly  associated  in  the  Decalogue  the  main  items 
of  man's  duty  to  his  neighbor,  and,  both  there  and 
elsewhere,  the  doctrines  of  rewards  and  punish- 
ments.    The  race  also  inherited  the  narrative  of 


OLD  TESTAMENT  IN  OUTLINE.  12/ 

what  is  termed  in  Christian  theology  the  Fall  of 
Man.  This,  however,  was  part  of  the  anterior 
tradition  ;  and,  though  implied  in  the  Mosaic 
system,  was  neither  directly  set  forth  in  its  terms, 
nor  made  a  common  subject  of  allusion  in  the  his- 
toric books,  however  it  may  have  been  involved  in 
the  sacrificial  system. 

But  these  rewards  and  punishments  are  of  a  tem- 
poral nature,  and  the  Mosaic  legislation  is  thought 
to  give  no  indication  of  a  future  state  or  of  an 
Underworld.  This  is  the  more  remarkable,  be- 
cause the  early  chapters  of  Genesis,  although  they 
usually  contain  but  the  merest  outline  of  history, 
are  not  without  such  indication  (Gen.  5  :  24). 
Enoch,  at  the  end  of  his  365  years,  "was  not, 
for  God  took  him."  These  remarkable  words  are 
substituted  for  the  formula  given  in  the  cases  of 
the  other  patriarchs,  whose  record  closes  with  the 
phrase,  "and  he  died"  (Gen.  5:5,  and  passim). 
Here  there  seems  to  be  a  clear  manifestation  of 
the  state  into  which  Enoch  is  declared  to  have 
entered  without  passing  through  the  gate  of  death. 


128  OFFICE  AND  WORK  OF  THE 

Again,  we  now  know,  from  the  Egyptian  Book 
of  the  Dead  and  otherwise,  that  the  religious  system 
of  that  country  not  only  included,  but  was  greatly 
based  upon,  the  conception  of  a  future  life.  It 
seems  absolutely  impossible  that  the  Israelites,  even 
had  they  not  been  aware  of  it  already,  could  have 
dwelt  for  many  generations  in  the  land  of  Egypt 
without  coming  to  know  of  it.  Our  Lord  himself 
affirms  that  they  knew  it  in  his  time  (Matt.  22 :  32; 
Mark  12  :  27).  And  we  have  it  exhibited  to  us  in 
the  Psalms  (for  example.  Psalms  16  :  10;  49  :  15), 
which  exhibit  the  interior  and  spiritual  life  of 
chosen  souls.  It  has,  perhaps,  been  too  much  the 
practice  to  assume  that  the  Mosaic  law  is  to  be 
regarded  as  an  enlargement  of  the  patriarchal  reli- 
gion. Without  doubt,  it  is  at  least  a  very  large 
and  important  supplement  to  that  religion.  But  a 
supplement  differs  from  an  enlarged  and  recon- 
structed edition :  it  is  less  as  well  as  more.  It 
need  not  contain  everything  contained  in  that  to 
which  it  is  a  supplement.  Here  is  a  great  and  vital 
particular  in  which  the  Mosaic  law  cannot  be  said 


OLD  TESTAMENT  IN  OUTLINE.  1 29 

even  to  have  republished  the  patriarchal  religion, 
and  which  both  preceded  and  survived  the  law, 
but  did  not  find  a  place  in  it.  Accordingly,  among 
the  Jews  of  the  Advent,  the  school  which  most 
rigidly  adhered  to  the  letter  of  the  law,  namely, 
that  of  the  Sadducees  (Acts  23  :  8),  denied  the 
future  state,  and  held  "  that  there  is  no  resurrec- 
tion, neither  angel  nor  spirit." 

We  are  not,  therefore,  to  suppose  that  Israel  was 
without  the  hope  of  a  future  life,  which  St.  Peter 
on  the  Day  of  Pentecost  himself  demonstrated  out 
of  the  Sixteenth  Psalm  (Acts  2  :  25),  but  only  to 
perceive  that  the  Mosaic  legislation  was  limited  to 
its  proper  purpose ;  that,  namely,  of  setting  apart  a 
nation  from  the  rest  of  mankind,  and  providing  it 
with  peculiar  means  and  guarantees  for  the  fulfil- 
ment of  its  mission  as  a  nation.  It  erected  a  walled 
precinct,  within  which  the  ancient  belief  of  the 
fathers  was  to  find  shelter  and  to  thrive,  while  it 
was  wofuUy  dwindling  and  perishing  among  all  the 
kindred  nations  of  the  world.  It  supplied  an  im- 
pregnable home  for  personal  religion.      But  per- 

9 


130  OFFICE  AND  WORK  OF  THE 

sonal  religion,  taken  by  itself,  is  conspicuously- 
weak  in  the  means  of  transmission  from  age  to 
age.  The  sons  of  Eli  were  wicked  persons,  and 
the  evil  Manasseh  succeeds  the  pious  Hezekiah. 
It  is  not  without  the  aid  of  fixed  and  solid  insti- 
tutions, which  take  hold  upon  masses  of  men 
collectively,  that  the  sacred  fire  is  kept  alive 
among  us.  Hence  our  Lord  did  not  merely 
teach  his  holy  precepts,  and  fulfil  his  Divine 
career  in  his  own  person,  but  founded  his  Church 
on  earth,  to  carry  his  work  onward,  even  to  the 
day  of  doom.  And  hence,  under  the  guidance 
of  the  Most  High,  Moses  was  commissioned  to 
establish  a  system  which,  without  being  in  itself 
complete,  provided  for  the  double  purpose,  first,  of 
building  up  a  fortress  (so  to  call  it)  within  whose 
wall  true  spiritual  religion  might  in  singular  fulness 
flourish  and  abound;  and,  secondly,  of  establishing 
a  firmly  knit  national  system  of  doctrine  and  wor- 
ship, intended  to  secure  the  permanent  purity  of 
belief  in  the  one  self-existent  God,  and  the  con- 
tinuing practice  of  a  ritual  which  set  forth  in  act 


OLD  TESTAMENT  IN  O  UTLINE,  1 3  I 

the  existence  of  sin,  and  made  intelligible  and 
familiar  to  the  people  at  large  some  need  of  deliv- 
erance from  it  by  reconciliation.  And  so,  through 
the  long  ages  from  the  Exodus  to  the  Advent,  there 
lived  on  the  two  systems  together,  distinct  but 
accordant.  The  one  was  the  religion  of  interior 
devotion,  powerfully  upheld  and  stimulated,  as 
occasion  offered,  by  the  Prophets,  and  continually 
exercised  and  developed  in  the  public  ritual  by  the 
Psalms.  The  other  was  the  religion  of  exterior  wor- 
ship. This  was  full  of  significance.  It  had  a  com- 
mand over  the  entire  people.  It  was  incorporated 
in  public  laws  and  institutions,  and  was  associated 
at  eveiy  point  with  the  national  life.  These  outer 
means  so  operated  as  to  exempt  the  higher  and 
interior  treasure  from  the  risks  of  dependence  on 
short-lived  individual  fervor,  and  provided  secure 
means  for  its  transmission  from  age  to  age. 

We  have  in  the  institution  of  the  prophetic 
school  the  setting  forth  of  a  profound  lesson, 
which  reminds  us  that  the  Mosaic  system  was 
alike  in  itself  necessary,  and  of  itself  insufficient. 


132  OFFICE  AND  WORK  OF  THE 

From  another,  and  possibly  even  more  com- 
manding, point  of  view,  we  perceive  the  insuffi- 
ciency of  Mosaism  to  fill  up  fully  the  outlines  of 
the  Divine  dispensations.  Sin,  in  the  form  of  dis- 
obedience to  Divine  command,  had  entered  into 
the  world,  and  had  utterly  marred  the  fair  order 
which,  at  the  outset,  the  Almighty  had  noted  in  his 
Creation.  The  mischief  was  not  left  to  stand  alone, 
and  the  promise  of  a  Redeemer  from  it  was  imme- 
diately delivered.  Thus  far  the  Mosaic  system 
helps  us,  yet,  in  helping  us,  tells  us  to  look  be- 
yond itself.  By  its  system  of  sacrifice  it  threw 
into  distinct  relief  the  idea  that  offense  had  been 
committed,  and  that  our  standing  was  not  upright 
before  God.  Now  with  this  were  associated  in 
Genesis  the  further  ideas  that  from  this  offense 
there  would  be  a  way  of  reconciliation  and  re- 
covery, and  that  this  way  would  be  found  in  a 
member  of  the  human  race,  a  portion  of  the  seed 
of  the  woman.  On  these  further  ideas  Mosaism 
so  far  threw  light,  that  it  pointed  through  sacrifice 
to  pardon ;  but  it  added  nothing  of  force  or  clear- 


OLD  TESTAMENT  IN  OUTLINE.  I33 

ness  to  the  original  promise  that  this  recovery- 
should  be  wrought  out  in  and  through  a  Redeemer 
havinGf  the  form  and  the  nature  of  man.  This 
prophecy  of  the  Incarnation,  though  a  vital  portion 
of  the  ancient  tradition  of  the  patriarchs,  did  not 
derive  any  supplement  or  new  enforcement  from  the 
construction  of  the  Hebrew  laws  and  institutions. 
It  remained,  and  it  propagated  itself,  mainly  in  the 
Psalms  and  in  the  Prophets,  while  its  root  was  pre- 
Mosaic.  Some  rays  of  the  light  of  that  promise 
may  perhaps  be  traced,  outside  the  Hebrew  pre- 
cinct, in  particular  traditions  of  the  heathen  world. 
There  may  be  vestiges  of  it  in  that  close  vital 
association  betwen  Deity  and  humanity,  which 
marked  the  Greek  or  Olympian  religion;  but 
which,  as  the  fundamental  conception  of  sin  more 
and  more  faded  away,  lost  all  its  moral  force. 
Mosaism  did  essential  and  infinite  service  in  deeply 
sculpturing  (so  to  speak)  the  idea  of  sin  in  the 
human  consciousness ;  but  it  was  not  favorable 
to  that  theanthropy,  or  union  of  the  Divine  and 
human,  of    which   the    human  side   had    been  so 


134  OFFICE  AND  WORK  OF  THE 

strongly  foreshadowed  in  the  original  charter. 
Perhaps  by  the  rigid  prohibition  of  images,  which 
was  so  necessary  for  its  direct  purpose,  it  rather 
tended  to  widen  the  distance,  at  which  man  stood 
as  a  being  worshiping  his  Maker.  Already  idola- 
try, such  as  prevailed  in  the  East,  was  associated 
with  the  human  form,  and  the  necessity  of  shutting 
out  that  idolatry  may  have  carried  with  it,  in  this 
respect,  a  certain  religious  incompleteness  as  a 
consequence. 

I  now  come  to  the  second  supposition ;  and  I 
ask  whether  the  selection  of  the  Hebrew  race  was 
grounded  on  their  moral  superiority.  Within 
narrow  limits,  the  answer  would  be  affirmative. 
They  were  appointed  to  purge  and  to  possess  the 
land  of  Canaan  on  account  of  the  terrible  and 
loathsome  iniquities  of  its  inhabitants.  The  na- 
tions whom  they  were  to  subdue  had  reached 
that  latest  stage  of  sensual  iniquity,  which  re- 
spects neither  God  nor  nature.  The  sensual  power 
within  man,  which  rebelled  against  him  when  he 
had  rebelled  against  God,  had  in  Canaan  enthroned 


OLD  TESTAMENT  IN  OUTLINE.  1 35 

its  lawlessness  as  law,  and  its  bestial  indulgences 
had  become  recognized,  normal,  nay  more,  even 
religious  and  obligatory.  And  there  are  those  in 
the  present  day  who,  admitting  the  facts,  find  in 
them  a  subject  of  pleasurable  contemplation,  as  if 
they  simply  exhibited  an  innocent  and  free  exercise 
of  natural  propensities.  The  propensities  were  due 
indeed  to  nature;  but  only  to  nature  in  a  condition 
of  disorder  and  disease. 

The  vicious  practices  of  these  nations,  indicated 
rather  than  described  in  the  Old  Testament,  and 
veiled,  apparently  for  decency's  sake,  in  the  transla- 
tions, are  too  sadly  attested  by  the  character  of  the 
remains,  which,  in  later  times,  archaeology  has 
recovered  from  their  hiding-places.  They  are  also 
attested  by  the  poems  of  Homer.  In  these  poems, 
the  Phoenicians  represent  S}-rian  religion,  and  we 
find  the  goddess  Aphrodite,  whose  debased  worship 
it  seems  plain  that  they  were  gradually  importing 
into  Greece,  to  have  stood  for  little  more  than  a 
symbol  of  lawless  lust.  This  is  "Ashtoreth,  the 
goddess  of  the  Zidonians  "  (i  Kings  1 1  :  5-33). 


136  OFFICE  AND   WORK  OF  THE 

I  find  it  much  more  difficult  to  answer  the  ques- 
tion, whether  the  Hebrew  race  were  planted  in  the 
land  of  promise,  which  flowed  with  milk  and  honey, 
by  reason  of,  or  in  connection  with,  their  moral 
superiority  to  the  nations  of  the  w^orld  taken  uni- 
versally. It  is,  down  to  the  present  day,  extremely 
difficult  to  make  any  trustworthy  estimate  of  the 
comparative  moral  standing  even  of  any  two  con- 
temporary peoples.  It  may  be  admitted  that  the 
form  of  human  nature  has  with  the  modern  condi- 
tions grown  far  more  manifold  and  complex.  But, 
on  the  other  hand,  in  answering  the  question  I  have 
just  put,  we  have  the  difficulty  not  only  of  remoteness 
in  time,  but  of  extreme  scantiness  of  information. 

I  shall  assume  that  the  mass  of  the  children  of 
Israel  at  large  were  trained  mainly  by  Mosaism, 
and  little  in  comparison  by  the  more  highly  spiritual 
tradition  conserved  and  enshrined  within  it  Speak- 
ing of  these,  we  may  consider  that  the  Old  Testa- 
ment gives  us  more  than  a  sketch,  if  less  than  a 
picture,  of  their  social  and  moral  state.  I  am  aware 
of  only  one  other  race,  with  respect  to  which  we 


OLD  TESTAMENT  IN  OUTLINE.  I  37 

have  any  account  possessing  a  tolerable  fulness. 
That  is  the  race  of  the  Achaian  Greeks,  painted 
with  marvelous  force  as  well  as  completeness  by 
Homer.  The  poet  describes  the  manners  of  one 
generation;  the  books  of  the  Old  Testament,  say 
from  Abraham  to  the  Captivity,  range  over  many. 
Still,  numerous  as  these  are,  they  present  a  con- 
siderable unity  of  color.  I  carefully  reserve  the 
case  of  that  inner  and  elect  circle  among  the  He- 
brews, to  whom  we  owe  the  possession  down  to 
this  day  of  inestimable  spiritual  treasures.  But 
comparing,  as  well  as  I  am  able,  ordinary  or  average 
life  among  the  ordinary  Hebrews  on  the  one  side, 
and  the  ordinary  Greeks  of  Homer  (whom  I  take 
to  have  lived  long  after  Moses,  but  considerably 
before  the  age  of  David)  on  the  other,  I  cannot 
discern  that  these  last  were  in  a  moral  sense  inferior. 
I  am  sensible,  however,  that  in  such  a  proposi- 
tion as  has  just  been  uttered  there  must  be,  to  the 
general  reader,  some  appearance  of  paradox ;  and 
likewise  that  such  an  appearance  will  not  be  effectu- 
ally removed  by  reference  to  the  scriptural  com- 


138  OFFICE  AND  WORK  OF  THE 

plaints  of  the  stiff  neck,  or  the  hard  heart,  of  the 
Israelites.  I  must  therefore  make  further  endeav- 
ors to  get  at  the  truth  of  the  case  before  us. 

I  do  not  feel  that  even  the  patriarchal  history  is 
designed  to  convey  to  us  the  idea  that  the  privi- 
leged race  stood  uniformly  at  a  great  moral  eleva- 
tion, as  compared  with  other  and  ordinary  portions 
of  mankind. 

The  subject  is  a  painful  one,  and  I  shall  not 
dilate  upon  its  details.  But  it  seems  undeniable 
that,  in  the  history  of  the  selected  line,  we  find 
from  time  to  time  the  development  of  wickedness 
in  its  extreme  forms.  Such  are  the  sin  of  Onan 
(Gen.  38  :  8,  9),  the  incest  of  the  daughters  of 
Lot  (Gen.  19  :  32),  and  the  brutal  insensibility  of 
Ham,  the  son  of  Noah,  to  the  claims  of  natural 
decency  (Gen  9  :  22).  Nor  are  the  women  ex- 
empt, as  we  learn  from  the  incest  devised  and 
effected  by  Tamar  (Gen.  38  :  6-30).  And  the 
wife  of  Lot  cast  a  yearning  look  on  the  hell  of 
Sodom  (Gen.  19  :  26).  The  first  three  cases, 
and  the  last,  are  not  in  the  line  of  the    ultimate 


OLD  TESTAMENT  IN  OUTLINE.  139 

succession ;  but  Pharez,  the  son  of  Tamar,  is  the 
recorded  ancestor  of  King  David  and  his  descend- 
ants (Matt.  I  :  3-5).  Now,  among  the  Achaian 
Greeks  of  Homer  we  find  a  sensitive  delicacy, 
altogether  peculiar,  as  to  all  exposure  of  the  per- 
son. There  is  nowhere  any  extreme  form  of 
sensual  indulgence.  Among  the  Boeotian  immi- 
grants from  the  East,  that  is  from  the  Syrian  coast, 
there  occurred  at  an  early  stage  of  their  history 
in  the  Peninsula,  a  case  of  incest;^  but  it  was  always 
regarded  by  the  indigenous  tradition  as  involun- 
tary, and  what  is  more,  a  curse  clave,  on  this  ac- 
count, to  the  race  of  Kadmos,  and  brought  about 
its  early  extinction. 

While  incest  is  thus  regarded  as  a  monstrous 
perversion  of  nature  among  the  Greeks,  there  are 
in  the  Homeric  poems,  as  I  think,  sufficiently  clear 
indications  that  it  was  practiced  without  shame 
among  the  Phoenicians,^  the  coast  neighbors  of 
Syria,  and  partners  with  it  in  manners,  if  not  also 
probably  in  race. 

lOd.  XI.    271-274.      2  0d.  X.   7,  and  less  flagrantly,  VII.   64-68. 


I40  OFFICE  AND  V/ORK  OF  THE 

Let  us  now  turn  to  two  others  among  the  great 
moral  constituents  of  human  character,  and  con-^ 
sider  the  case  of  humanity  as  against  cruelty,  and 
of  truth  as  against  fraud. 

Let  us  take  the  two  cases  first  of  the  deceit  prac- 
ticed by  Jacob  upon  his  brother  Esau  and  his 
father  Isaac  ;  secondly,  of  the  base  and  unnatural 
conduct  of  the  sons  of  Jacob  towards  their  brother 
Joseph.  As  there  is  nothing  recorded  in  favor  of 
the  Homeric  or  Achaian  Greeks  which  approaches 
in  moral  beauty  to  the  forgiveness  freely  accorded 
by  Joseph,  so  there  is  nothing  recorded  against 
them  which  so  wickedly  tramples  down  the  laws  of 
nature,  as  the  flagrant  iniquities  to  which  attention 
has  just  been  called.  The  conduct  of  the  suitors 
of  Penelope  in  the  Odyssey,  and  the  actions  of 
Paris  (a  foreigner),  supply  the  worst  exhibitions 
of  human  nature  which  come  before  us  in  the 
Poems.  Both  there  and  in  the  Old  Testament 
retribution  follows  guilt,  but  what  I  now  speak  of 
is  the  depth  of  guilt,  not  its  treatment.  There  is 
nowhere  in  Homer  a  case,  between   relatives,  of 


OLD  TESTAMENT  IN  OUTLINE.  141 

deceit  like  that  of  Jacob,  or  of  cruelty  like  that  of 
his  sons. 

When  we  come  to  the  Palestinian  period,  it  would 
appear  that  the  Israelites  were  subjected  to  a  force 
and  diversity  of  temptations,  such  as  perhaps  no 
people  ever  had  to  encounter.  Successful  war  had 
stimulated  their  vindictive  passions.  Triumph 
eveiy where  had  waited  on  their  arms.  They  were 
entitled  to  esteem  themselves  the  directly  chosen 
ministers  of  God.  They  were  likely  to  regard  the  » 
heathen,  among  whom  they  came,  with  hatred  and 
contempt.  They  passed  from  a  life,  wandering, 
uncertain  and  ill  supplied,  to  settlement  and  to 
abundance.  The  temples  or  emblems  of  seductive 
lust  everywhere  met  their  eyes;  and  the  vile  ex- 
ample, by  which  they  were  solicited  in  the  mass 
and  in  detail,  pretended  plausibly  to  hallow  itself 
by  close  association  with  religion.  There  is 
scarcely  an  evil  passion  that  finds  entrance  into 
the  human  breast  which  was  not  powerfully  stirred 
by  the  circumstances  of  the  Israelitish  conquest. 
We   find   in   the   sacred   text   indications    of    the 


142  OFFICE  AND   WORK  OF  THE 

severity  of  some  of  their  temptations.  Take,  for 
instarxce,  Deuteronomy  6  :  10-16  ;  and  again  in 
31  :  20  it  is  written  : 

"For  when  I  shall  have  brought  them  into  the  land 
which  I  sware  unto  their  fathers,  that  floweth  with  milk 
and  honey;  and  they  shall  have  eaten  and  filled  them- 
selves, and  waxen  fat ;  then  will  they  turn  unto  other 
gods  and  serve  them,  and  provoke  mC;  and  break  my 
covenant." 

The  general  indication  seems  to  be  first  the  per- 
petuation of  a  chosen  seed,  at  the  very  heart  of  the 
nation,  high  in  the  knowledge  of  interior  religion; 
second!}^,  a  decided  ethical  superiority  of  the 
Hebrew  line  over  the  Asiatic  nations  in  their 
neighborhood,  as  indeed  it  was  from  Asia  that 
the  extremes  of  corruption  flowed  into  the  Greek 
Peninsula  in  the  earliest  historic  times.  Yet  the 
loveliest  picture  of  womanhood  in  all  the  early 
sacred  books  is  that  of  Ruth ;  and  Ruth  was  of 
the  children  of  Moab,  who  was  the  incestuous  off- 
spring of  one  of  the  daughters  of  Lot  (Gen. 
19-36,  3;). 


OLD  TESTAMENT  IN  OUTLINE,  143 

Humanity,  or  mercy,  is  certainly  not  the  strong 
point  of  the  Achaian  Greeks.  With  them  not  only 
no  sacredness,  but  little  value,  attached  to  human 
life;  and  the  loss  of  it  stirs  no  sympathy  unless  it 
be  associated  with  beauty,  valor,  patriotism,  or 
other  esteemed  characteristics.  Yet  here,  again, 
the  forms  of  evil  are  less  extreme.  We  do  not 
find,  even  in  the  stern,  relentless  vengeance  of 
Odysseus  on  his  enemies,  or  in  the  passionate  wish 
of  Achilles  that  nature  would  permit  what  it  for- 
bade, namely,  to  devour  his  hated  foe,  a  form  of 
cruelty  and  brutality  so  savage  as  is  recorded  in 
the  case  of  the  Levite  with  his  wife  and  concubine 
at  Gibeah,  and  of  the  war  which  followed  it  (Judg. 
19-21). 

The  temptations  of  lust  were  even  more  formida- 
ble that  those  of  cruelty  and  revenge.  According 
to  the  sacred  text,  this  danger  was  foreseen  from 
the  first;  and  the  very  earliest  Mosaic  legislation 
(Exod.  22  :  16),  after  that  of  the  Commandments, 
begins  to  denounce  a  portion  of  the  indescribable 
practices  which  were  rife  among  the  older  occupiers 


144  OFFICE  AND  WORK  OF  THE 

of  the  promised  land.  It  was  subsequently  carried 
into  further  particulars,  and  we  know  that,  down 
the  whole  course  of  the  historic  period  before  the 
Captivity,  the  filthy  idolatry  not  only  encircled  the 
chosen  people,  but  at  times  so  invaded  it  as  to 
reduce  to  a  remnant  the  untainted  portion  of  the 
community,  the  true  worshipers  of  God.  Even 
pious  monarchs  were  sometimes  afraid  to  destroy 
its  constituted  and,  in  a  perverse  sense,  consecrated 
emblems. 

On  the  other  hand,  we  must  not  view  the  case  of 
the  earliest  Greeks  in  the  spirit  of  optimism.  War 
and  its  devastations  were  with  them  habitual  and 
almost  normal;  property  was  little  respected;  cun- 
ning as  well  as  skill  was  sometimes  held  in  honor. 
Yet  it  remains  a  broad  and  indisputable  truth  that 
honor  and  truth,  as  well  as  valor,  were  prevailingly 
respected,  that  family  ties  were  very  sacred,  that  the 
law  of  nature  was  simply  and  profoundly  revered, 
and  that  the  extreme  forms  of  vice  and  sin,  the 
widest  and  most  hopeless  departures  from  the  law  of 
God,  are  nowhere  to  be  found  in  any  of  their  forms. 


OLD  TESTAMENT  IN  OUTLINE.  1 45 

Enough  has  perhaps  been  said  to  show  that  we 

cannot  claim  as  a  thing  demonstrable  a  great  moral 

superiority  for  the  Hebrew  line  generally  over  the 

whole    of   the    historically    known    contemporaiy 

races.     This,  however,  leaves  ample  room  for  the 

belief  that  there  was  an  interior  circle,  known  to 

us  by  its  fruits   in   the  Psalter  and  the  prophetic 

books,  of  a  morality  and  sanctity  altogether  superior 

to  what  Vv'as  to  be  found  elsewhere,  and  due  rather 

to  the  pre-Mosaic,  than  to  the  Mosaic,  religion  of 

the  race.     But  it  remains  to  answer  with  reverence 

the  question,  Why,  if  not  for  a  distinctly  superior 

morality,  nor  as  a  full  religious  provision  for  the 

whole  wants  of  man,  why  was  the  race  chosen,  as 

a  race,  to  receive  the  promises,  to  guard  the  oracles, 

and   eventually  to    fu^^I    the   hopes,  of  the   great 

Redemption  ? 

The    answer   may,    I   believe,   be   conveyed   in 

moderate  compass.     The  design  of  the  Almighty, 

as  we  eveiywhere  find,  was  to  prepare  the  human 

race,  by  a  varied  and  a  prolonged   education,  for 

the  arrival  of  the  greatest  epoch  of  history.     The 

10 


146  OFFICE  AND   WORK  Oh    THE 

immediate  purposes  of  the  Abrahamic  selection  may 
have  been  to  appoint,  for  the  task  of  preserving  in 
the  world  the  fundamental  bases  of  religion,  a  race 
which  possessed  qualifications  for  that  end  deci- 
sively surpassing  those  of  ail  other  races.  We 
may  easily  indicate  two  of  these  fundamental  bases. 
The  first  was  the  belief  in  one  God.  The  second 
was  the  knowledge  that  mankind  at  large  had  de- 
parted from  his  laws;  without  which  knowledge 
how  should  they  welcome  a  Deliverer  whose  object 
it  was  to  bring  them  back?  It  may  be  stated  with 
confidence,  that  among  the  dominant  races  of  the 
world  the  belief  in  one  God  was  speedily  destroyed 
by  polytheism,  and  the  idea  of  sin  faded  gradually 
but  utterly  away.  Is  it  audacious  to  say  that  what 
was  wanted  was  a  race  so  endowed  with  the  qualities 
of  masculine  tenacity  and  persistency,  as  to  hold 
over  in  safe  custody  these  all-important  truths  until 
that  fulness  of  time,  when,  by  and  with  them,  the 
complete  design  of  the  Almighty  would  be  revealed 
to  the  world?  A  long  experience  of  trials  beyond 
all  example  has  proved  since  the  Advent  how  the 


OLD  TESTAMENT  IN  OUTLINE.  I^/ 

Jews,  in  this  one  essential  quality,  have  all  along 
surpassed  every  other  people  upon  earth.  A  mar- 
velous and  glorious  experience  has  shown  how 
among  their  ancestors  before  the  Advent  were  kept 
alive  and  in  full  vigor  the  doctrine  of  belief  in  one 
God,  and  the  true  idea  of  sin.  These  our  Lord, 
when  he  came,  found  ready  to  his  hand,  essential 
preconditions  of  his  teaching.  And  in  the  exhibi- 
tion of  this  great  and  unparalleled  result  of  a  most 
elaborate  and  peculiar  discipline,  we  may  perhaps 
recognize,  sufficiently  for  the  present  purpose,  some- 
thing of  the  office  and  work  of  the  Old  Testament. 


IV. 

THE  PSALMS. 


I. THEIR    HISTORIC    PLACE    IN   THE    DEVOTION 

OF   ALL   AGES. 

John  Bright  has  told  me  that  he  would  be  con- 
tent to  stake  upon  the  Book  of  Psalms,  as  it  stands, 
the  great  question  whether  there  is  or  is  not  a 
Divine  Revelation.  It  was  not  to  him  conceivable 
how  a  work  so  widely  severed  from  all  the  known 
productions  of  antiquity,  and  standing  upon  a  level 
so  much  higher,  could  be  accounted  for  except  by 
a  special  and  extraordinary  aid  calculated  to  pro- 
duce special  and  extraordinary  results ;  for  it  is 
reasonable,  nay  needful,  to  presume  a  due  corre- 
spondence between  the  cause  and  the  effect.  Nor 
does  this  opinion  appear  to  be  unreasonable.     If 

Bright  did  not  possess  the  special  qualifications  of 
148 


THE  PSALMS.  149 

the  scholar  or  the  critic,  he  was,  I  conceive,  a  very 
capable  judge  of  the  moral  and  religious  elements 
in  any  case  that  had  been  brought  before  him  by 
his  personal  experience. 

It  was,  in  truth,  a  noble  distinction  of  the  Hebrew 
race  to  have  produced  persons  imbued  with  such 
qualities  and  gifts  as  were  capable  of  composing 
the  Book  of  Psalms. 

Twice  in  his  Epistles  (Eph.  5  :  19;  Col.  3  :  16) 
does  St.  Paul  admonish  Christians  upon  musical 
services  as  a  fitting  vent  for  the  devout  mJnd  and 
heart.  In  both  cases  ^he  employs  the  same  phra- 
seology, and  enjoins  the  use  of  "psalms  and  hymns 
and  spiritual  songs,"  each  time  giving  the  first 
place  in  the  enumeration  to  Psalms.  I  find  it  diffi- 
cult to  dismiss  the  idea  that  in  this  word  the  use 
of  the  Psalter  was  either  intended  or  included,  es- 
pecially as  there  are  early  testimonies  to  the  effect 
that  antiphonal  singing  was  in  use  from  the  origin 
of  the  Church.^ 

Upon  the  most  superficial  survey  of  the  Psalms 

1  As  to  the  last-named  point,  see  Wordsworth  and  Alford,  in  loco. 


150  THE  PSALMS. 

in  their  general  aspect,  it  seems  difficult  or  impos- 
sible to  regard  them  as  simply  owing  their  parent- 
age to  the  Mosaic  system.  Some,  indeed,  of  their 
features,  may  well  be  referred  to  it ;  especially  the 
strong  sense  of  national  unity  which  they  display, 
and  the  concentration  of  that  sense  upon  a  single 
center,  the  city  of  Jerusalem  and  the  temple. 

It  may  also  be  noted  that  the  Mosaic  law  incul- 
cated in  its  utmost  breadth  the  principle  of  love  to 
God.  "  Thou  shalt  love  the  Lord  thy  God  with  all 
thine  heart,  and  with  all  thy  soul,  and  with  all  thy 
mii^ht "  (Deut.  6  :  4,  5).  Yet  may  it  not  be  said, 
from  the  place  in  which  it  occurs,  that  this  is  rather 
exhortation  than  statute?  Further,  it  is  not  un- 
folded in  the  detail  of  the  legislative  Torah ;  and, 
even  in  the  Decalogue,  service  is  enjoined  without 
the  mention  of  love.  The  early  books  do  not  ex- 
hibit, like  the  Psalter,  the  close,  inner  contact  of 
the  individual  soul  with  the  Deity ;  and,  as  water 
does  not  rise  above  the  source,  it  is  hard  to  ascribe 
to  them  alone  the  wonderful  development  of  that 
principle  which  pervades  the  body  of  this  unpar- 


THE  PSALMS.  15^ 

alleled  collection.     We  seem  compelled  to  assume 
for  them  some  loftier  fountain-head  of  instruction. 
This,  I  would  submit,  is  in  part  supplied  and  in 
part  suggested  by  the   Book   of  Genesis.     I   say 
suggested,  inasmuch  as  the  outlines  of  a  primeval 
religion  drawn  in  that  book  are  not  less  slight  than 
they  are  significant     So  slight,  indeed,  that  I  have 
been  unable  to  resist  the  impression  that  there  were 
supplementary  communications  of  Divine  truth  over 
and  above  those  contained  in  Holy  Writ,  and  per- 
haps traceable,  here  and  there,  in  later  portions  of 
the  Old  Testament  and  of  the  Apocryphal  Books. 
And  I  also  say  supplied,  inasmuch  as  the  stoiy  of 
the  Fall  involves  in  full  the  idea  of  our  restoration 
in  character  as  well  as  condition,  which  is  nowhere 
enunciated  in  the  Law ;  and  further,  inasmuch  as  it 
sets  forth,  at  least  down  to  the  time  of  Abraham,  a 
personal  intercourse,  habitual  and  direct,  with  the 
Deity,    and    one   pointing    onward    to    the    great 
Redemption. 

In  a  preceding  essay  I  have  represented  that  the 
Mosaic  law  was  not  the  promulgation  of  a  new  and 


152  THE  PSALMS. 

complete  religion,  but  a  code  of  provisions  intended 
for  the  particular  purpose  (i)  of  building  up  a  v/all 
of  effectual  separation  between  the  Jewish  com- 
munity and  the  corruption  of  the  nations  whose 
land  they  were  to  conquer  and  to  possess ;  and  (2) 
of  preserving  in  vitality  and  freshness,  within  that 
precinct,  the  fundamental  conceptions  of  the  Divine 
unity  and  righteousness,  and  of  the  duty  and  the 
sinfulness  of  man.  These  all-important  proposi- 
tions v/ere  the  necessary  pre-conditions  of  any  plan 
for  the  restoration  of  peace  in  a  disordered  world. 
But  they  were,  nevertheless,  in  process  of  extirpa- 
tion from  the  general  and  public  religion  of  all  those 
Gentile  races  whose  history  is  given  us  in  Scripture, 
or  in  the  classical  books  of  profane  antiquity. 

Thus  the  Mosaic  system,  ^vhile  it  was  defensive 
against  the  surrounding  iniquity,  was  also  some- 
thing more,  and  something  higher.  That  system, 
both  institutional  and  doctrinal,  fenced  in,  as  it  v/ere, 
a  clear  space,  a  free  and  secure  dom.ain,  for  the 
fuller  development  of  a  religion,  inv/ard  and  per- 
sonal,  devotional   and   spiritual,  the  materials  for 


THE  PSALMS,  1 53 

which  it  could  hardly  have  supplied  by  presenting, 
as  it  did,  God  as  ruler  and  judge,  and  man  as  a 
servant  v/ho  continually  either  sinned  or  was  on  the 
brink  of  falling  into  sin. 

In  the  inner  sanctuary,  thus  provided  for  the  most 
capable  human  souls,  was  reared  the  strong  spiritual 
life,  wliich  appears  to  have  developed  itself  pre- 
eminently in  the  depth,  richness,  tenderness,  and 
comprehensiveness  of  the  Psalms.  To  the  work 
they  have  here  accom.plished  there  is  no  parallel 
upon  earth.  For  the  present  I  put  aside  all  details, 
and  am  content  to  stand  upon  this  fact — that  a 
compilation  v/hich  began  (at  the  latest)  vvith  a  shep- 
herd of  Palestine,  three  thousand  years  ago,  has 
been  the  prime  and  paramount  m.anual  of  devotion 
from  that  day  to  this ;  first  for  the  Hebrew  race, 
both  in  its  isolation  and  after  it  was  brought,  by 
the  translation  of  its  sacred  books,  into  relations 
with  the  Gentile  world ;  and  then  for  all  the  Chris- 
tian races,  in  all  their  diversities  of  character  and 
circumstance.  Further,  that  there  is  now,  if  pos- 
sible, less  chance  than  ever  of  the  disolacement  of 


154  THE  PSALMS. 

these  marvelous  compositions  from  their  supremacy 
in  the  worship  of  the  Christian  Church.  And,  be- 
yond doubt,  it  may  be  also  said  that  their  function 
has  not  been  one  of  ritual  pomp  and  outward  power 
alone.  They  have  dwelt  in  the  Christian  heart,  and 
at  the  very  center  of  that  heart ;  and  wherever  the 
pursuits  of  the  inner  life  have  been  most  largely 
conceived  and  cultivated,  there,  and  in  the  same 
proportion,  the  Psalms  have  towered  over  every 
other  vehicle  of  general  devotion.  We  have  a  con- 
spicuous illustration  of  their  office  in  the  fact  that 
of  two  hundred  and  forty-three  actual  citations  from 
the  Old  Testament  found  in  the  pages  of  the  New, 
no  less  than  one  hundred  and  sixteen  are  from  the 
single  book  of  Psalms ;  and  that  a  similar  propor- 
tion holds  with  most  of  the  early  Fathers.^    Bishop 

1  Canon  Cook,  in  the  Speaker's  Bible,  IV.,  146.  There  is  a 
minor,  but  still  not  unmeaning,  indication  to  the  same  effect,  which  it 
would  be  unseemly  to  couple  with  that  given  in  the  text,  but  which  I 
venture  to  name  for  its  recency,  and  because  it  is  eminently  asso- 
ciated with  the  general  course  of  modern  life.  In  a  manual,  not  of 
hymns,  but  of  devotions,  prepared  for  public  use  in  the  mixed  con- 
gregations on  board  a  great  line  of  packet-ships  from  Great  Britain 
to  North  America,  I  find  that,  out  of  254  pages,  137  are  occupied  by 
selections  from  the  Psalms ;  the  chief  part  of  the  remainder  being  a 
collection  of  hymns. 


THE  PSALMS.  1 55 

Alexander  has  published  the  result  of  a  careful 
examination  made  by  himself  It  is,  that  reference 
is  made  to  the  Psalms,  either  by  quotation  or  other- 
wise, in  no  fewer  than  two  hundred  and  eighty-six 
passages  of  the  New  Testament/ 

We  have  thus  before  us  the  fact  that  the  Psalms, 
composed  for  the  public  worship  of  the  Hebrews 
from  two  to  three  thousand  years  ago,  constitute 
down  to  the  present  day  for  Christians  the  best  and 
highest  book  of  devotion.  A  noteworthy  fact  even 
on  the  surface  of  it ;  more  noteworthy  still,  when 
we  go  below  the  surface  into  the  meaning.  The 
Hebrews  were  Semitic,  Christendom  is  (chiefly) 
Aryan ;  the  Hebrews  were  local,  Christendom  is 
world-wide;  the  Hebrews  were  often  tributary,  and 
finally  lost  their  liberties  and  place  among  the 
nations ;  Christianity  has  mounted  over  every  ob- 
stacle, and  has  long  been  the  dominating  power  of 
the  world.  The  Hebrews  had  no  literature  outside 
their  religion,  nor  any  Fine  Art;  Christendom  has 
appropriated,  and  even  rivaled,  both  the  literature 

*  "  The  Witness  of  the  Psalms."     Note  A,  p.  291. 


156  THE  PSALMS. 

and  the  art  of  the  greatest  among  the  ancients. 
This  strange  book  of  Hebrew  devotions  had  no 
attraction  outside  Hebrewism,  except  for  Christians; 
and  Christians  have  found  nothing  to  gather,  in  the 
same  kind,  from  any  of  the  other  rehgions  in  the 
world.  The  stamp  of  continuity  and  identity  has 
been  set  upon  one,  and  one  only,  historic  series ; 
one,  and  one  only,  thread  runs  down  through  the 
whole  succession  of  the  ages  ;  and,  among  many 
witnesses  to  this  continuity,  the  Psalms  are  prob- 
ably among  the  most  conspicuous.  This  stamp 
purports  to  be,  and  to  have  been  all  along,  Divine ; 
and  the  unparalleled  evidence  of  results  all  goes  to 
show  that  it  is  not  a  forgery. 

The  wonderful  phenomenon  thus  presented  to  us 
can  hardly  be  said  to  adm.it  of  enhancement ;  and 
yet  it  is,  perhaps,  enhanced,  when  we  bear  in  m.ind 
that  the  long  period  of  this  perpetual  youth, 
exhibited  by  the  Psalms,  has  been  one  broken  by 
the  promulgation  of  a  new  religion,  together  with 
all  the  changes  of  fact,  and  developmxcnts  of  prin- 
ciple, which  transformed  the  heathen  world. 


THE  PSALMS.  157 

Moreover,  we  should  remember  that  the  shapings 
of  all  language  merely  human  are  essentially  short- 
lived, and  forms  of  speech  succeed  one  another  as 
wave  follows  upon  wave.  But  herein  seems  prob- 
ably to  lie  one  of  the  ways  in  which  the  Divine 
revelation  asserts  itself  It  appears  to  have  the 
faculty  of  giving  to  things  mutable  the  privilege 
and  the  power  of  the  immutable,  and  to  endow 
fashions  of  speech,  Vv^ien  they  belong  to  the  heai-t's 
core  of  human  nature,  with  a  charter  that  is  to 
endure  throughout  all  time. 

I  submit,  then,  that  the  fact  of  so  wonderful  a 
power  as  was  thus  exercised  by  the  Psalms,  in  such 
diversities  of  time,  race,  and  circumstances,  is  not 
only  without  parallel,  but  is  removed  by  such  a 
breadth  of  space  from  all  other  facts  of  hum.an 
experience  in  the  same  province,  as  to  constitute  in 
itself  a  strong  presumption  that  the  cause  also  is 
one  lying  beyond  the  range  of  ordinaiy  human 
action,  and  may  most  reasonably  be  set  down  as 
consisting  in  that  speciality  of  Divine  suggestion 
and  Q-uidance,  which  we  term  revelation. 


158  THE  PSALMS, 

II. THEIR   ANTIQUITY. 

The  antiquity  of  the  Book  of  Psalms,  Hke  that 
of  the  other  books  of  Scripture,  does  not  directly 
or  necessarily  involve  the  essence  of  the  case  con- 
cerning them,  which  I  apprehend  is  more  depend- 
ent upon  their  character  and  their  results.  Yet  it 
counts,  for  importance,  in  the  next  order  of  con- 
siderations, since  the  form  and  substance  are  here 
more  intimately  allied  than  in  the  terms  used  for 
the  recital  of  events  in  a  historical  book. 

It  is  also  to  be  assumed  that  the  incessant  use 
of  the  Psalms  in  the  service  of  the  temple,  and  the 
comparatively  wide  knowledge  of  them  thus  con- 
veyed to  the  people,  were  in  the  nature  of  special 
securities  for  their  faithful  and  exact  transmission. 

When  we  speak  of  the  Psalms  of  David,  we  use 
a  popular  and  general  form  of  expression,  which 
names  the  whole  from  the  largest  or  most  weighty, 
and,  originally,  most  conspicuous,  of  the  parts. 
The  phrase  is  sufficiently  shown  not  to  be  absolute 
and  precise  by  the  beautiful   137th  Psalm,  which 


THE  PSALMS.  159 

describes  the  condition  of  the  Hebrews  in  Babylon, 
five  centuries  after  the  death  of  the  minstrel  King. 
Seventy-three  Psalms^  in  all  are  ascribed  to  him. 
This  is  not  the  assumption  or  opinion  of  conserva- 
tive writers  only.  Bleek,  whose  work  is  revised 
and  sanctioned  by  Wellhausen,  admits  it  to  be  a 
matter  of  the  highest  probability  that  no  incon- 
siderable number  of  the  Psalms  are  due  to  his 
authorship.^  He  also,  with  others,  largely  accepts 
the  inscriptions  which  are  prefixed  to  them.  Ac- 
cording to  Canon  Cook,  a  judicious  and  able  writer, 
it  was  never  held  that  the  entire  Psalter  was  the 
work  of  the  King ;  and  he  says  that,  in  the  tim.e  of 
the  Maccabees,  the  completion  of  the  book  was 
ascribed  to  Nehemiah.  He  thinks  that  a  large 
proportion  of  the  two  closing  books  (out  of  the 
five  Books  composing  the  Psalter)  belong  to  the 
period  of  or  following   the   Exile.  ^      But  of  the 

1  Cook's  Introduction,  ibid.,  p.  150. 

2  "  Einleitung  in  das  alte  Testament  .    .*  .  besor^  von  J.  Wellhau- 
sen."    Sect.  221.     Berlin.    1886. 

3 Cook's  Introduction,  p.  156.     The  Books  are  Psalms  1-41,  42-72. 
73-89,  90-106,  107-150, 


l6o  THE  PSALMS. 

three  Psalms  most  pointedly  referable  to  the  Mes- 
siah, two  (Psa.  22,  no)  are  Davidic.  He  shows 
how  the  conclusive  objections  to  the  theory  which 
refers  the  Psalms  to  the  Maccabean  age  are  sus- 
tained by  various  advanced  German  writers,  and 
Bleek  holds  that  no  Psalm  can  be  shown  to  be 
later  than  Nehemiah.  But  the  master  idea  of  the 
whole  argument  is  not  so  much  that  such  and 
such  Psalms  were  produced  at  such  and  such  an 
era,  as  that  the  Book  at  large  is  the  product  of 
that  influence  which  stamps  it,  like  the  other 
books  of  Holy  Scripture,  as  embodying  a  Divine 
revelation. 

On  this  point  of  antiquity  it  is  more  than  enough 
if  a  large  portion  of  the  Psalms  are  ascribable  to 
King  David.  1  venture,  however,  to  offer  two  sug- 
gestions. First,  the  Psalms  come  to  us  through  a 
channel  supplied  by  the  kingdom  of  Judah,  not  the 
kingdom  of  Israel.  If  they  had  been  largely  com- 
posed after  the  sevei-ance  of  the  ten  tribes  from  the 
two,  would  they  not  have  presented  some  more 
definite  indication  of  that  severance?      Now,  the 


THE  PSALMS.  l6l 

name  of  Israel  is  the  name  under  which  in  the 
Psalms  the  chosen  people  are  described.  We  have 
this  name  repeated  twenty-six  times.  The  name  of 
Judah  was  likely,  it  may  be  supposed,  after  the 
schism,  to  become  the  prevailing  and  distinctive 
name.  It  would  so  continue  after  the  captivity  and 
dispersion  of  the  ten  tribes,  and  as  long  as  their 
remnants  continued  to  maintain  any  serious  and 
systematic  rivalry  with  the  southern  kingdom.  Yet, 
throughout  the  Psalter,  we  never  find  the  name  of 
Judah  mentioned  in  this  paramount  sense.  Jerusa- 
lem is  mentioned  seventeen  times  and  Sion  thirty- 
eight,  together  fifty-five  times.  But  the  name  of 
Judah  only  occurs  ten  times,  and  never  with  this 
paramount  significance.  It  is  mentioned  either  to- 
gether with  Israel  (Psa.  76  :  i ;  1 14  :  2)  or  in  con- 
junction with  other  tribes,  as  with  Ephraim  and 
Manasseh  in  Psalms  60  :  7  and  108  :  8,  or  with  Sion; 
but  always  locally  or  tribally.  Could  this  have  been 
so  if  the  Psalms  had  mainly  been  composed  when 
Judah  was  the  only  acknowledged  name  for  the 

elect  people,  and  Israel  was  a  stranger,  often  an 

II 


l62  THE  PSALMS. 

enemy,  always  the  symbol  of  a  rival  and  apparently, 
from  the  character  of  its  priesthood  (i  Kings  12  : 
31 J   13  •  33)j  ^  degraded  worship? 

Secondly :  the  one  great  deliverance  commemo- 
rated in  the  Psalms  (as  also,  I  understand,  in  the 
later  Jewish  Liturgies)  is  the  deliverance  from 
Egypt.  See,  for  example,  Psalms  6Z,  72,  80,  81, 
105,  106,  114,  135,  136.  Could  this  have  been  the 
case  if  the  Book  was  unknown  until  the  time  when, 
between  the  people  and  their  earlier  past,  there  arose 
up  a  frightful  specter  ?  I  refer  to  the  terrible  ex- 
perience of  the  Captivity  in  Babylon. 

And  yet,  surely,  there  were  incidents  attendant 
upon  that  Captivity  which  might  have  carved  upon 
the  Jewish  mind  recollections  yet  deeper,  in  some 
respects,  than  those  of  Egypt.  In  that  country,  if 
their  treatment  had  been  cruel  and  degrading,  yet 
they  must,  upon  the  whole,  have  flourished,  inas- 
much as  they  grew  there  from  a  family  into  a 
people.  But  the  Babylonish  captivity  entailed, 
firstly,  the  loss  of  what  was  not  only  an  ancestral 
home,  but  the  local  seat  of  the  Divine  promise  to 


THE  PSALMS.  1 63 

their  race;  secondly,  the  loss  of  the  worship  di- 
vinely ordained,  and  attached  to  the  temple  of 
Jerusalem;  thirdly,  the  loss  of  the  kingly  line,  and 
of  that  prized  nationality  in  and  by  which  they 
were  preferred  before  all  the  nations  of  the  earth. 
Is  it  then  conceivable,  if  the  Psalms  in  general  owed 
their  origin  to  the  time  of  the  Captivity,  that  the 
composers  of  them  should,  in  numerous  and  con- 
spicuous cases,  have  dwelt  so  long  and  so  often  on 
the  details  of  the  Egyptian  bondage,  and  should 
never  but  once  and  briefly  have  made  reference, 
specific  indeed  but  narrow,  to  the  one  recent  catas- 
trophe, choosing  rather  to  go  back  to  the  centuries 
dimmed,  in  comparison,  by  the  interval  of  a  thou- 
sand years? 

It  seems  more  than  possible  that  this  argument 
may  be  decisively  supported  by  that  portion  of  the 
Book  of  Jeremiah  which  distinctly  prophesies,  not 
long  before  the  Captivity,  that  a  time  is  coming 
when  the  servitude  in  Egypt  shall  cease  to  be  the 
one  commanding  recollection  of  the  Hebrews,  and 
its  place  shall  be  taken  by  the  Exile  in  Babylon. 


1 64  THE  PSALMS. 

"  Therefore,  behold,  the  days  come,  saith  the  Lord,  that 
it  shall  no  more  be  said,  The  Lord  liveth,  that  brought  up 
the  children  of  Israel  out  of  the  land  of  Egypt ; 

"  But,  the  Lord  liveth,  that  brought  up  the  children  of 
Israel  from  the  land  of  the  north,  and  from  all  the  lands 
whither  he  had  driven  them ;  and  I  will  bring  them  again 
into  their  land  that  I  gave  unto  their  fathers  "  (Jer.  i6 :  14,  1 5). 

The  arguments,  drawn  from  general  features  and 
from  historical  probability,  respecting  the  antiquity 
of  the  Books  of  the  Old  Testament,  are  in  some 
degree  common  to  the  Torah,  or  Books  of  Moses, 
and  the  Psalms.  The  Psalms  have,  however,  the 
benefit  of  the  admission  I  have  cited  from  the  leader 
of  the  negative  school  in  our  own  day, — that  a 
considerable  number  are  probably  from  the  pen  of 
David.  And  there  are  also  points  in  which  reason- 
ing, available  to  show  the  antiquity  of  the  Torah, 
has  an  enhanced  force  for  the  Psalms. 

We  see,  for  example,  that  the  history  of  the 
Israelites,  from  the  conquest  of  Canaan  to  the  Cap- 
tivity, is,  upon  the  whole,  a  history  of  decaying 
faith.  This  is  exhibited  in  the  original  demand  for 
the  change  to  a  monarchy  from  that  earlier  form  of 


THE  PSALMS.  1 65 

government  by  Judges,  which  powerfully  suggested 
the  presence  and  providence  of  the  Almighty  by 
leaving  unoccupied  the  place  upon  earth  most  sym- 
bolical of  him.  It  was  shown  by  the  increased 
wickedness  of  the  kings,  and  by  the  enlarged  and 
developed  ofnce  of  the  Prophets.  For  these  were 
like  an  army  of  reserve  in  support  of  the  Divine 
dispensation  which  takes  its  position  on  the  field 
of  battle  in  the  hour  of  need. 

It  is  also  observed  by  Sack,^  that  in  the  period 
succeeding  the  exile  the  original  creative  force  of 
the  Hebrew  spirit  died  out,  and  that,  as  formalism 
advanced,  the  sectarian  lines  of  party  were  sharpened 
and  deepened.  In  both  these  tracts  of  history,  the 
spirit  and  voice  of  the  Book  of  Psalms  throw  us 
back  upon  antiquity,  and  even  upon  a  distant 
antiquity.  They  seem  to  be  manifestly  the  product 
as  of  a  school,  so  probably  of  an  age,  of  living,  ener- 
getic faith.  And  they  are  not  less  eminently  nota- 
ble for  the  harmony  which  pervades  the  religious 

1 "  Die  altjiidische  Religion  im  iibergange  vom  Bibelthume  zum  Tal- 
mudismus,  von  Israel  Sack."     Berlin.    1889.    EinUitung,  pp.  13,  ^eq- 


l66  THE  PSALMS, 

community.     "Jerusalem  is  built  as  a  city,  that  is 
at  unity  in  itself"  (Psa.  122  :  3). 

III. THEIR    CONTENTS. 

Let  us  now  look  for  a  moment  at  the  contents  of 
this  book,  which  are  such  as  to  fasten  our  wonder 
upon  them,  and  to  leave  little  room  for  any  surprise 
that  they  should  have  established  for  themselves, 
in  collective  worship  and  in  personal  devotion,  the 
place  to  which  no  parallel  is  elsewhere  to  be  found 
in  the  experience  of  the  human  race.  And,  on  the 
other  hand,  I  shall  not  fail  to  notice  in  their  proper 
place  the  objections  which  some  have  urged  against 
the  Book  of  Psalms. 

The  multiplication  of  divinities  under  the  system 
which  we  term  polytheism,  had  tended  to  estab- 
lish everywhere  a  system  of  what  are  termed 
national  gods.  These  act  within  the  sphere  of  a 
particular  race  or  country :  they  are  open  to  the 
competition  of  other  deities,  when  through  migra- 
tion or  conquest  these  spheres  happen  to  overlap. 
They  do  not  claim  the  allegiance  of  other  races, 


THE  PSALMS.  167 

or  show   care,  or,  so  to   speak,  responsibility,  for 
their  welfare. 

I  do  not  indeed  deny,  but  should  be  forward 
to  assert,  that  while,  in  the  early  stages  of  historic 
antiquity,  this  nationalizing  process  seems  to  harden 
more  and  more  with  the  gradual  accretions  of 
legendary  tradition,  we  can  trace  among  the  my- 
thologies, in  various  degrees  of  faintness  or  clear- 
ness, the  older  idea  of  a  supreme  God ;  of  a  belief 
in  one  Ruler  of  the  universe,  anterior  and  superior 
to  these  multiform  powers.  We  find  in  many 
cases  disguised  resemblances  of  that  original  be- 
lief; but  it  is  most  commonly  with  such  disloca- 
tion of  its  elements,  such  exaggerations,  such 
intrusion  of  ideas  foreign  to  it,  as  to  defy  all  at- 
tempts, at  least  in  the  present  state  of  knowledge, 
to  ascend  the  channel  upwards  to  the  source.  The 
schemes  become  so  complex  as  to  defy  any 
rational  account  of  the  original  deviation  :  even 
when  their  basis  is  found  to  lie  in  the  several 
powers  of  external  nature,  which  were  not  known 
to  be  connected  by  any  common  tie,  but  which 


1 68  THE  PSALMS, 

received  the  names  of  gods,  and  were  combined 
into  religious  systems.  These  pooular  gods  be- 
came reahties  in  two  senses:  first,  subjectively, 
because  as  they  were  accepted  in  the  minds  of 
men,  the  associations  connected  with  them  became 
a  source  and  spring  of  human  action ;  secondly, 
because  the  images,  under  which  they  came  to  be 
represented,  gave  them  a  real  existence  at  least  in 
the  material  sphere.  It  is,  therefore,  natural,  that 
the  Psalms,  in  phrases  concerning  deity,  should 
not  be  confined  to  the  one  God,  but  should  say, 
for  example,  that  among  the  gods  there  is  none 
like  him,  or  should  exhort  the  worshipers  to  give 
thanks  unto  the  God  of  gods  (Psa.  Z6  \Z  \  136  :  2. 
See  Exod.  15  :  11). 

Yet  no  reader  of  the  Psalms  can  fail  to  see  that 
they  are  strictly,  unconditionally,  and  exclusively 
monotheistic.  God  is  undoubtedly  the  God  of 
Israel,  and  the  worshipers  properly  describe  him 
in  the  terms  which  most  closely  correspond  with 
his  relation  to  themselves.  There  seems  to  be  a 
great  mixture  of  the  terms  of  Elohim  and  Jehovah, 


THE  PSALMS.  1 69 

and  in  none  o.  the  five  books  is  the  use  of  the 
properly  Hebrew  name  exclusive.^  But,  without 
drawing  any  argument  from  this  intermixture,  the 
Psalms  make  it  plain  that  the  God  whom  they 
adore  is  from  everlasting,  and  is  the  God,  not  of 
Palestine,  but  of  the  whole  world  :  "  Sing  unto 
God,  O  ye  kingdoms  of  the  earth ;  O  sing  praises 
unto  the  Lord ;  who  sitteth  in  the  heavens  over  all 
from  the  beginning  "  (Psa.  68  :  32,  33).  And  his  eye 
and  care  are  over  all  men.  "  O  praise  the  Lord,  ail  ye 
heathen :  praise  him,  all  ye  nations.  For  his  merci- 
ful kindness  is  ever  more  and  more  towards  us ;  and 
the  truth  of  the  Lord  endureth  for  ever  "  (Psa.  1 17). 
No  doubt  the  "  Lord  "  is  represented  as  having 
special  relations  with  and  special  care  for  Israel. 
But  these  are  relations  of  affection,  not  of  exclu- 
sion.    A  Psalm  declares  indeed — 

"  He  shall  choose  out  an  heritage  for  us  ;  even  the  wor- 
ship of  Jacob,  whom  he  loved." 

But  the  very  same  Psalm  had  already  sounded  the 
trumpet  note. 

^  Cook's  Introduction,  p.  149. 


I70  THE  PSALMS. 

"  O  clap  your  hands  together,  all  ye  people  ;  O  sing  unto 
God  with  the  voice  of  melody :  for  the  Lord  is  high,  and  to 
be  feared ;  he  is  the  great  king  upon  all  the  earth  "  (Psa. 
47  :  4,  and  1,2). 

Among  the  notes,  then,  of  the  supreme  position 
of  the  Psalms,  and  of  the  religion  to  which  they 
belonged,  we  find  this  idea  of  the  one  God,  who  is 
also  the  universal  God,  and  the  universal  Governor 
of  men,  and  who  thereby  stands  broadly  distin- 
guished from  what  we  find  to  be  the  character  of 
the  polytheistic  systems  and  of  their  heads ; 
namely,  divinity  restrained  by  limits  of  the  races 
or  countries  of  antiquity. 

But  the  form  of  the  Almighty,  thus  divested  of 
the  limitations  of  mere  nationality,  and  exhibited 
in  the  majesty  of  perfect  Oneness  and  Omnipotence, 
revealed  itself  through  the  Psalms  in  other  and 
more  tender  aspects.  His  care  for  the  poor  and 
for  the  stranger  might  be  learned  from  the  books 
of  the  law,  and  may  be  traced  in  other  religions 
among  the  remnants  of  true  Theism.  Still,  that  is 
a  function  of  government  only,  though  of  benevo- 
lent government,  and  it  is  compatible  with  the  idea 


THE  PSALMS.  171 

of  immeasurable  remoteness.  But  in  the  Psalms 
is  developed  with  singular  force  and  beauty  the  idea 
of  Omnipotence  in  the  attitude  of  nearness  to  man: 
and,  more  conspicuously  still,  of  nearness  to  the 
individual  man.  In  Heaven,  and  in  the  Under- 
world, and  at  the  extremities  of  earth,  "  even  there 
also  shall  thy  hand  lead  me,  and  thy  right  hand 
shall  hold  me"  (Psa.  139  :  6-9). 

The  presence  thus  brought  near  is  not,  as  in 
Exodus  (Exod.  19  :  12,  13,  21),  a  consuming,  but  a 
soothing  and  sustaining  presence  (Psa.  23).  When 
thus  brought  near,  the  Almighty  is  invested  in  re- 
lation to  us  with  all  those  capacities  of  action  and 
of  sympathy  which  fill  in  human  nature  the  depart- 
ment of  the  affections.  In  the  mouth  of  the  ob- 
jector this  is  termed  anthropomorphism.  I  do  not 
presume  to  say  that  there  is  not  in  it  some  pre- 
figuration  of  the  Messiah,  made  in  all  such  things 
like  as  we  are.  But  that  there  is  no  deflection  from 
the  loftiness  of  the  monotheistic  idea  we  know 
from  this,  that  the  same  people  who  gave  utterance 
to  the  Psalms  have  been  the  most  rigid  and  lofty  in 


172  THE  PSALMS. 

their  definitions  of  the  Godhead.  As  when  it  is 
said  by  Maimonides  that  with  God  "there  is  neither 
folly  nor  wisdom,  like  the  wisdom  of  a  wise  man ; 
neither  sleep  nor  waking;  neither  anger  nor  laugh- 
ter ;  neither  joy  nor  sorrow ;  neither  silence  nor 
speech,  like  the  speech  of  the  sons  of  men."^  Yet 
it  is  he  that  is  not  only  the  guardian  of  his  people, 
but  as  it  were  their  sentinel ;  and  not  of  his  people 
only,  but  of  every  one  among  them,  as  truly  and  as 
much  as  of  the  whole.  In  truth,  the  two  threads 
of  national  and  of  personal  Providence  are  so  inter- 
twined in  the  Psalms  that  they  scarcely  can  be 
severed.  "  He  will  not  suffer  thy  foot  to  be  moved, 
and  he  that  helpeth  thee  will  not  sleep;"  and  then 
in  the  very  next  verse,  by  a  transition  not  less  gen- 
tle than  complete,  "  Behold,  he,  that  keepeth  Israel, 
shall  neither  slumber  nor  sleep."  There  is  no  de- 
tail too  minute  for  describing  the  closeness  of  this 
protection:    "He  is   thy  defence    upon  thy   right 

1  Maimonides,  "Yad  Hachazakah,"  Transl.  Bernard,  Cambridge, 
1832,  p.  39.  Declarations  not  less  remarkable  are  to  be  found  in  the 
More  Nebuchim,  or  "  Guide  of  the  Perplexed."  See  also  the  work  of 
Dr.  Ginsburg  on  the  Kabbala,  pp.  87-89  (London  :  Longmans.   1864). 


THE  PSALMS.  173 

hand;"  "The  Lord  shall  preserve  thy  going  out 
and  thy  coming  in :  from  this  time  forth  for  ever- 
more" (Psa.  121  :  3-5,  8).  But  no  mere  selection 
can  rightly  convey  a  picture  of  the  close  and  inti- 
mate care  which  this  and  so  many  others  of  the 
Psalms  describe  in  setting  forth  the  attitude  of  the 
Almighty  toward  his  worshipers. 

I  will  not  quit  this  portion  of  the  subject  without 
quoting  a  remarkable  testimony  to  the  elevation 
of  the  Psalter  from  a  recent  critic  generally  nega- 
tive, but  one  who  makes  his  affirmative  declarations 
with  an  exemplary  sincerity  and  fervor.  He  speaks 
of  the  Psalter  as  follows :  "  It  is,  as  a  whole,  the 
expression  and  fruit  of  the  principles  of  the  Jewish 
religion  as  they  existed  in  the  minds  of  pious 
Israelites.  Its  one  great  theme  is  the  clinging  of 
the  human  spirit  to  God.  In  joy  and  sorrow,  in 
victory  and  defeat,  in  moods  of  saintliness  or  sin, 
the  spirit  of  the  poor  earthly  wayfarer  here  pours 
out  its  plaint  and  prayer  to  the  God  of  its  life. 
.  .  .  What  exultation  is  here  for  high  days 
of  victory  and  joy!     What   touching   moans   of 


1/4  THE  PSALMS. 

penitence !  What  child-like  cries  for  help  !  What 
entreaties  from  the  soul  that  can  only  say,  *  Out  of 
the  depths  I  have  cried  unto  thee ! '  What  delight- 
ful confidences  between  the  trustful  spirit  and  the 
Shepherd  who  leadeth  by  the  green  pastures  and 
the  still  waters!"^ 

I  must  not  altogether  pass  by  the  Messianic 
Psalms.  These  are  the  songs  which  show,  by  the 
adaptation  of  their  language  to  Him  and  to  his 
office,  either  that  their  composers  had  a  prevision 
of  his  coming,  or  that  such  prevision  was  conveyed 
into  their  strain  by  the  higher  influence  which 
prompted  it.  It  is  not  necessary  here  to  debate 
their  number.  Suffice  it  to  specify  Psalms  2,  21, 
22,  45,  72,  no.  And  it  is  sufficiently  plain  that 
the  principle  of  prophecy  which  is  involved  in 
them,  whether  conscious  or  unconscious  to  the 
composer,  is  the  same  which  belongs  to  the  other 
predictions  and  prefigurations  in  the  books  of  the 
Old  Testament.  But  they  differ  from,  and  go  be- 
yond, the  rest  in  this  important  particular.     The 

1  Seven  Lectures  by  the  Rev.  J.  P.  Hopps,  VII.,  p.  33. 


THE  PSALMS.  1/5 

primitive  religion  descends  through  them,  as  it 
were  by  an  inner  conduit.  The  great  and  cardinal 
facts  of  the  lapse  of  man  from  righteousness,  and 
of  the  need  and  promise  of  a  Redeemer,  were  em- 
bodied by  the  Psalms  in  the  perpetual  public  wor- 
ship of  the  Temple ;  they  thus  became  part  of  the 
open,  common  inheritance  of  all;  and  were  sys- 
tematically forced,  so  to  speak,  upon  the  attention 
of  the  people,  that  they  might  come  into  personal 
and  conscious  appropriation  of  this  most  precious 
and  absolutely  central  part  of  their  covenanted 
privileges. 

When  the  foot  of  the  Greek  first,  and  afterwards 
of  the  Roman,  trod  the  streets  of  Jerusalem  ;  when 
the  treasures  of  the  Hebrew  books  were  unlocked 
to  the  Gentile  world  through  the  Septuagint;  then 
there  happened,  we  may  justly  assume,  one  of  two 
things.  There  was,  as  we  know  upon  strong 
heathen  testimony,  before  the  advent  of  our  Lord, 
a  universal  and  traditional  expectation  in  the  East 
that  a  great  power  was  to  arise  in  Judaea  and  to 
subdue  the  world.     How  came  it  that  so  remark- 


1/6  THE  PSALMS. 

able  a  conception,  foreign  to  the  cultivated  com- 
munities of  the  Greek  and  the  Italian  peninsulas, 
and  apparently  menacing  the  continuance  of  the 
Roman  dominion,  should  at  this  time  have  been 
prevalent  in  the  East?  The  East  had,  indeed, 
through  a  long  series  of  centuries,  supposed  itself 
entitled  to  the  mastery  of  the  world :  hence  the 
wild  expedition  of  Darius  into  Scythia,  and  the 
repeated  conflicts  of  Persia  with  the  Greeks.  It 
is  not  strange  that  this  heritage  should  in  some 
shape  or  other  be  reclaimed,  for  ideas  of  this  kind 
are  tenacious  of  life,  and  easy  of  revival.  But 
what  is  at  first  sight  most  strange  is,  the  choice 
of  the  spot  from  which  deliverance  was  to  pro- 
ceed. It  was  not  from  any  of  the  seats  of  ancient 
power,  the  fame  of  which  was  still  on  record ;  but 
from  among  the  small,  isolated,  and  undistin- 
guished people  who  inhabited  Palestine,  and 
whose  brief  appearance  on  the  stage  of  human 
affeirs  as  conquerors,  in  the  time  of  King  David, 
was  so  slight  in  limit  and  in  duration,  as  to  have 
inscribed  no  mark  upon  the  page  of  general  his- 


THE  PSALMS.  1 77 

tory.  It  had  passed  away,  like  the  old  empire  of 
the  Hittites.  The  Jews  were  also  a  people,  whose 
manners  and  institutions  repelled  rather  than 
attracted  the  sympathy  of  the  world.  One  suppo- 
sition, explanatory  of  this  remarkable  expectation, 
might  be  that  it  had  lived  on  from  prehistoric 
times  in  feebleness  and  obscurity,  but  had  come  to 
the  front  when  the  East  felt  the  hard  hand  of  power 
pressing  on  it  from  Rome,  and  welding  it  for  the 
first  time  by  a  permanent  system  into  uniformity 
of  servitude  or  inferiority,  from  which  it  panted 
for  deliverance.  But  it  seems  more  probable  that 
the  Jewish  Scriptures,  which  had  for  two  centuries 
become  known  by  translation  into  Greek,  were 
themselves  the  fountain-head  of  this  most  remark- 
able anticipation ;  and  in  that  case  its  popular 
promulgation  would  seem  most  probably  to  have 
been  due,  in  an  eminent  degree,  to  the  Messianic 
Psalms,  which  were,  of  all  the  available  evidence, 
the  part  most  in  the  eye  and  mind  of  the  people. 

Such  being,  in  outline,  the  presentation  of  God 
to  man  in  the  Book  of  Psalms,  let  us  consider  in  its 

12 


1^8  THE  PSALMS. 

turn  the  manner  in  which  they  present  man  to  God. 
Now  this  may  be  set  forth  in  a  multitude  of  par- 
ticulars, but  they  are  all  capable  of  being  summed 
into  one.  For  we  have  seen  that  the  Psalms  are 
a  book  of  spiritual  communion,  not  only  between 
God  and  man,  not  only  between  God  and  his 
Church,  or  especially  chosen  people,  but  also,  and 
even  pre-eminently,  between  God  and  the  indi- 
vidual man. 

As  it  is  the  fashion  of  the  day  to  assert  for  the 
sacred  books  of  other  religions  a  kind  of  parity 
with  the  Old  Testament,  I  ask  the  reader  to  spend 
a  few  moments  on  this  subject. 

No  doubt  there  are  points  at  which  resemblance 
may  be  traced  between  the  Hebrew  devotions  and 
those  of  the  outer  world :  not  those  of  the  outer 
world  generally,  for  from  the  Greek  mind,  as  repre- 
sented by  the  Greek  literature,  devotion,  properly 
so  called,  has  disappeared  ;  the  rise  of  intellect,  sad 
and  strange  as  this  may  sound,  was  the  fall  of 
piety.  But  let  it  be  granted  that  in  the  Vedas, 
for  example,  and  in  the  Babylonian  Hymns,  there 


THE  PSALMS,  179 

are  points  of  contact  with  the  Psalms.  Do  those 
points  of  contact  run  along  the  whole  line?  are 
they  continuous,  or  are  they  isolated?  Is  it  co- 
incidence, or  is  it  a  sort  of  tangential  contact  only, 
or  one  which  reminds  us  of  the  definition  of  a  point 
as  that  which  has  position  but  not  magnitude 
in  space  ? 

May  not  those  hymns  be  described  as  belonging 
only  to  the  idea  of  dependence  upon  the  Deity — to 
the  power  and  grandeur  which  exist  on  one  side, 
the  misery  and  weakness  on  the  other  ?  This  is 
perhaps  what  is  called  the  religious  sentiment,  the 
religion  of  which  we  have  a  subjective  need,  and 
which  we  are  now  constantly  (and  doubtless  in 
good  faith)  assured  is  not  to  disappear  on  the  sub- 
mergence of  positive  religion  and  its  institutions. 
But  does  this  give  us  anything  near  a  true  concep- 
tion of  the  Psalms  ?  They  are  based  upon  the  idea, 
not  of  dependence  only,  but  of  sympathy  and  com- 
munion. Yes,  for  the  work  of  spiritual  discipline, 
the  human  soul  is  there  almost  lifted  upwards,  as 
St  Paul  was,  into  the  third  heaven,  and  meets  the 


l80  THE  PSALMS. 

Creator  as  son  meets  father,  face  to  face.  It  is  not 
possible,  perhaps,  to  carry  this  idea  farther  than  it 
is  carried  in  the  Psalms.  It  is  certainly  not  woven 
into  a  closer  tissue  in  Thomas  a  Kempis,  after  four- 
teen centuries  of  Christian  ideas  and  practices.  ^ 
We  approach  to  it  in  the  Prophets,  when,  through 
Isaiah,  the  Almighty  invites  us  to  a  pleading  (Isa. 
I  :  1 8),  "  Come  now,  and  let  us  reason  together  " 
(see  also  Ezek.  18:25,  29).  But  can  we,  even  in  idea, 
press  it  further  or  lift  it  higher  than  in  that  marvel- 
ous expostulation  of  the  Forty-fourth  Psalm.  It 
defies  the  test  of  extract  or  quotation.  From  the 
fifth  verse  to  the  end  it  is  a  sustained  note  of  mov- 
ing, sorrowing  appeal,  lifted  as  far  above  the  level  of 
any  merely  human  effort  known  to  us  as  the  flight 
of  the  lark,  "hard  by  the  sun,"  is  lifted  above  the 
swallow,  when  it  foresees  the  storm  and  skims  the 
surface  of  the  ground.  Such,  as  set  forth  in  the 
Psalms,  are  the  inward  exercises  of  the  individual 
soul. 

Not  that  the  stamp  set  upon  the  Psalms  is  uni- 
form :   it  is   highly  diversified.      Take  the  noble 


THE  PSALMS.  l8l 

First  Psalm,  which  opens  the  Book.  It  sets  forth 
in  one  part  (vs.  3  and  4)  with  a  tender  beauty,  in 
another  with  strong  and  stern  denunciation,  the 
positions  of  the  righteous  and  of  the  wicked  before 
God.  But  it  sets  them  forth,  as  it  were,  from  the 
outside.  So,  again,  many  of  the  Psalms,  dealing 
with  the  Israelites  as  a  whole,  have  for  their  theme 
national  deliverance  and  glory.  But  let  us  turn  to 
the  penitential  Psalms,  and  most  of  all  to  the  Fifty- 
first,  in  which  King  David  ^  sounds  the  lowest 
depths  of  sorrow  and  shame  for  sin,  and  has 
provided  for  the  penitent  of  every  age  and  every 
character  the  medicine  that  his  case  required.  On 
these  Psalms  as  a  whole,  on  this  Psalm  in  par- 
ticular, and,  again  on  the  Thirty-eighth  Psalm, 
most  of  all  in  its  first  moiety,  let  us  fasten  our 
attention  for  a  moment.  Have  modern  learning 
and  research  succeeded  in  extracting  from  all  the 
sacred  books  of  all  the  ancient  religions  of  the 
world  anything  like,  I  do  not  say  a  parallel,  but  an 

iSome  critics  argue,  not  without  some  reason  on  their  side,  that  the 
two  last  verses  are  an  exilic  addition. 


1 82  THE  PSALMS. 

ever  so  remote  approach  to  them  ?  The  great  dis- 
course of  our  Lord  to  Nicodemus,  in  the  third 
chapter  of  St.  John,  might  find  in  these  composi- 
tions a  basis  broad  enough  to  sustain  the  whole  of 
his  startling  doctrine,  "except  a  man  be  born  again, 
he  cannot  see  the  kingdom  of  God  "  (John  3  :  3). 

Penitence  thus  lying  at  the  door  of  the  process 
by  which  man  is  appointed  to  ascend  to  holiness, 
this  golden  book  supplies,  beyond  all  others,  the 
types  and  aids  for  attaining  it  in  all  its  stages.  All 
that  special  class  of  virtues,  which  were  unknown 
to  the  civilized  world  at  the  time  when  the  Apostles 
preached  them,  had  been  here  set  forth  in  act  a 
thousand  years  before,  and  stored  up  for  use,  first 
within  the  narrow  circle  of  the  Jewish  worship,  and 
then  in  the  Church,  which  claims,  and  which  may 
yet  possess,  the  wide  world  for  its  inheritance. 
Another  standard  of  virtue,  indeed,  and  in  itself  a 
glorious  one,  the  Greek  and  the  Roman  world  pos- 
sessed. They  had  their  code  of  justice,  fortitude, 
temperance,  and  wisdom.  But  this  list  of  virtues 
contained  no  recognition  of  the  terrible  and  world- 


THE  PSALMS.  1 83 

wide  face  of  sin,  and  opened  no  road  to  the  acqui- 
sition of  powers  capable  of  contending  against  it, 
and  of  casting  down  its  strongholds  to  the  ground. 
That  road  was  to  be  opened  by  the  Beatitudes  of 
the  Sermon  on  the  Mount,  and  by  the  Faith,  Hope, 
and  Charity  of  St.  Paul.  Now,  is  there  one  of 
those  Beatitudes  which  has  not  been,  in  its  blossom 
or  its  germ,  anticipated  by  the  Psalms  ?  Take  the 
sanctification  of  sorrow  in  verse  4 :  so  the  Psalm 
instructs  us,  "  Thy  loving  correction  shall  make  me 
great"  (Psa.  18  :  35).  Take  the  blessing  of  the 
meek  (v.  5).  So  says  the  Psalmist  :  "  Lord,  I 
am  not  high-minded.  I  have  no  proud  looks.  I 
refrain  my  soul  and  keep  it  low.  My  soul  is  even 
as  a  weaned  child"  (Psa.  131  :  i,  3).  These 
are  principles,  not  only  which  the  ancient  philoso- 
phies did  not  contain,  but  which  they  would  have 
repudiated  and  contemned.  Take  again  that  bless- 
ing of  satiety  which  is  promised  to  '*  hunger  and 
thirst "  after  righteousness ;  words  which  indicate 
such  an  adult  age,  such  a  fulness  of  growth  and 
stature  in  the  new  man  of  the  Christian  system. 


1 84  THE  PSALMS, 

that  what  was  at  first  lesson  fi-om  without  has  come 
to  be  appetite  fi-om  within,  and  part  of  the  untaught 
spontaneous  working  of  a  renewed  humanity.  But 
this  idea  is  fully  developed  in  the  Psalms  (Psa.  42 ; 
1,2):"  Like  as  the  hart  desireth  the  water  brooks, 
so  longeth  my  soul  after  thee,  O  God.  My  soul  is 
athirst  for  God,  yea,  even  for  the  living  God: 
when  shall  I  come  to  appear  before  the  presence  of 
God."  Even  the  doctrine  of  forgiveness,  of  doing 
good  to  enemies,  to  the  growth  of  which  the  con- 
ditions of  Hebrew  life  were  less  favorable,  finds 
expression  in  the  Psalms.  Take  Psalm  35  :  12,  13  : 
"  They  rewarded  me  evil  for  good.  Nevertheless, 
when  they  were  sick  I  put  on  sackcloth,  and  hum- 
bled my  soul  with  fasting."  And  again,  "  If  I  have 
rewarded  evil  unto  him  that  dealt  friendly  with  me: 
yea,  I  have  delivered  him  that  without  any  cause  is 
mine  enemy  "  (Psa.  7  :  4).  It  is,  I  submit,  the  gen- 
eral strain  of  the  Psalms  to  which  we  should  look. 
And  who  will  deny  that  they  habitually  abound  in 
humility,  in  penitential  abasement,  in  the  strong 
faith  which  is  the  evidence  of  things  not  seen,  in 


THE  PSALMS.  1 85 

fervor,  self-mistrust,  filial  confidence  towards  God  ? 
These  and  all  kindred  qualities  they  develop  in 
what,  for  want  of  a  better  word,  I  will  term  their 
innerness.  Their  tones  come  from  the  inmost  heart, 
and,  not  with  a  rude  familiarity,  yet  with  a  wonder- 
ful nearness,  they  seem  to  seek  the  response,  if  the 
phrase  may  be  used  without  irreverence,  from  the 
inner  heart  of  God  himself 

All  this  is  severed,  as  a  whole,  by  an  immeasur- 
able distance,  from  the  language,  ideas,  and  mental 
habits  of  pagan  antiquity.  What  we  find  there  of 
religion  associated  with  intellectual  culture  turns 
upon  the  external  relations  between  God  and  man, 
as  between  sovereign  and  subject,  or  master  and 
dependant.  The  prehistoric  verse  of  Homer 
abounds  in  prayers.  They  are  not  such,  commonly, 
as  we  should  use,  yet  they  indicate  fully  these 
external  relations.  But  in  the  life  of  later,  of 
classical,  Greece,  prayer  seems  wholly  to  have  lost 
its  force  and  place  as  a  factor  in  human  life. 

Again,  in  the  "  Odyssey  "  of  Homer  we  have 
remaining  traces  of  the  personal  relation  between 


1 86  THE  PSALMS, 

man  and  God.  In  the  intercourse  of  Athene  with 
Odysseus,  and  reversely  in  her  action  on  the  minds 
of  the  guilty  suitors,  there  are  distinct  traces  of 
the  working  of  a  Divine  force  within  the  soul  of 
man.  I  do  not  remember  to  have  found  anything 
like  this  in  the  later  classical  literature.  But  the 
development  of  the  principle  and  idea  of  a  com- 
munion with  God,  operative  on  human  feeling, 
thought,  and  action,  is  the  standing  and  central 
thought  of  the  Psalms,  And  it  is  probable  that, 
the  more  fixedly  we  regard  them,  the  more  of  their 
distinctive  marks  we  shall  perceive,  even  as  the 
stars  in  heaven  multiply  to  the  gazing  eye.  The 
pervading  idea  of  a  living  communion  with  the 
Most  High,  the  communion  which  both  gives  and 
takes,  exhibits  and  fulfils  itself  in  many  ways. 
One  of  them  is  the  use  of  intercessory  prayer ;  a 
trait  conspicuously  absent  from  the  numerous  and 
interesting  prayers  of  Homer.  Another  is  that, 
while  full  of  warm  personal  interests  they  persist- 
ently hold  up  the  banner  of  a  righteousness  apart 
from  and  above   all   personal    interests  whatever. 


THE  PSALMS.  1 8/ 

Another  is  that  the  affections,  alienated  by  sin, 
have  returned  to  their  allegiance,  and  are  arrayed 
on  the  side  of  the  Most  High.  The  testimonies  of 
God  are  the  "  very  joy "  of  the  Psalmist's  heart. 
It  is  all  his  desire  that  the  Divine  will  should  have 
free  course  and  be  glorified  upon  earth.  The  glory 
of  God  has  become  to  him  a  profound  personal 
interest.  "  Set  up  thyself,  O  God,  above  the 
heavens ;  and  thy  glory  above  all  the  earth." 
Sentiments  of  this  type  are,  I  apprehend,  hardly  to 
be  found  outside  the  precinct  of  the  Hebrew  race. 

I  will  only  note,  in  passing,  before  quitting  this 
subject,  two  remaining  characteristics ;  the  height 
of  that  sacredness  which  the  Psalms  attach  to  the 
claims  of  the  poor ;  and  their  sense  of  the  utter 
worthlessness  of  all  ceremonial  observances,  though 
commanded,  except  in  connection  with  the  service 
of  the  will,  and  purification  of  the  heart. 

IV. THE    OBJECTIONS    TAKEN    TO    THEM. 

Referring  to  what  has  been  said  elsewhere  on 
the  presence  of  a  human  element  in  Holy  Scrip- 


1 88  THE  PSALMS. 

ture,  I  will  now  say  a  few  words  on  the  special 
objection  which  is  lodged  against  the  Psalms. 

Let  me  first  endeavor  to  reduce  the  question  to 
its  true  dimensions.  The  criticism  is  not  here,  as 
it  might  be  in  some  cases  of  books  claiming  to  be 
sacred,  that  they  are  feeble,  or  fanciful,  or  remote 
from  human  interests,  or  that  large  veins  of  clay 
run  through  such  true  metal  as  they  contain.  The 
Psalms,  in  their  sublimity  and  in  their  sympathy, 
so  immeasurably  divine  and  so  intensely  human, 
are  proof  against  all  such  criticism,  which  would 
be  only  cavil.  The  only  dart  which  really  rings 
upon  their  coat  of  mail,  is  the  dart  which  carries 
the  reproach  of  their  severe  and  unmeasured  de- 
nunciation of  enemies. 

And  first,  in  order  to  disembarrass  the  question 
of  matter  which  appears  to  be  extreme  and  excep- 
tional, I  will  refer  to  the  verse  which  represents  the 
ne  plus  ultra  of  the  difficulty,  as  it  stands  in  the 
Prayer-book  Version  of  the  Psalms ;  in  respect  to 
which  we  pay  a  certain  price  for  its  incomparable 
majesty   and   beauty,  in   the   shape   of  occasional 


THE  PSALMS.  189 

though  rare  shortcomings  as  to  accuracy.  The 
Prayer-book  gives  verses  21,  22,  of  Psalm  139,  as 
follows : — 

"  Do  not  I  hate  them,  O  Lord,  that  hate  thee  :  and  am  not 
I  grieved  with  those  that  rise  up  against  thee  ? 

"  Yea,  I  hate  them  right  sore :  even  as  though  they  were 
mine  enemies." 

Which  seems  to  say,  "  I  have  a  reserved  stock  of 
special  and  superlative  hatred  for  those  who  have 
not  only  sinned  in  general,  but  have  sinned  against 
me  in  particular."  But  this  notion  is  completely 
put  aside  in  the  translation  direct  from  the  Hebrew 
as  it  stands  in  the  Authorized,  and  also  in  the  Re- 
vised Version,  where  the  second  of  the  two  verses 
runs : 

"  I  hate  them  with  a  perfect  hatred ;  I  count  them  mine 
enemies." 

This  seems  not  to  set  up  the  selfish  feeling,  about 
offense  personally  received,  above  the  sentiment  of 
indignation  and  resentment  against  wickedness ; 
but  to  say  only,  "  All  that  I  might  feel  against  a 
personal  enemy,  all  that  natural  exasperation  would 


I90  THE  PSALMS, 

suggest,  I  discharge  upon  the  enemies  of  God." 
But  the  sentiment  concerning  them  has  ah*eady  been 
expressed  in  terms  not  admitting  of  enlargement. 
"  I  hate  them  with  a  perfect  hatred."  And  this 
brings  the  objection  to  a  point.  It  is  that  this 
unmeasured  detestation  and  invocation  of  wrath  by 
man  even  upon  God's  enemies  cannot  be  justified, 
and  is  not  to  be  referred  to  divine  inspiration. 

Now  let  us  notice,  in  the  first  place,  that  the 
general  tone  of  the  Psalms  concerning  enemies  is 
not  aggressive,  but  defensive.  A  sense  of  trouble 
and  danger  from  the  might  of  experienced  or 
impending  assault,  and  an  appeal  to  God  for  protec- 
tion, furnish  the  staple  sentiment  of  the  book.  I 
quote  a  single  instance,  which  is  a  fair  sample  of 
the  whole  of  this  class  of  passages,  from  Psalm  56 : 
I,  2:— 

"Be  merciful  unto  me,  O  God,  for  man  goeth  about  to 
devour  me :  he  is  daily  fighting  and  troubling  me. 

"Mine  enemies  are  daily  in  hand  to  swallow  me  up:  for 
they  be  many  that  fight  against  me,  O  thou  Most  Highest." 

Let  those  who  question  the  assertion  I   have 


THE  PSALMS.  191 

made,  that  this  passage  has  a  character  typical  of 
the  whole,  refer  (among  other  places)  to  Psalms 
5  :  8 ;  6  :  7;  7  :  5 ;  18  :  27,  passim;  56  :  9  i  59  •  i ; 
69  :4;   118  :  11,  12;   138  17;   143  :  9. 

But  undoubtedly  a  certain  number  of  passages 
are  not  defensive,  they  are  denunciatory;  such  as 
Psalms  54  :  5,  7;  59  :  10;  92  :  11;  143  :  12.  I  will 
recite  this  last  verse  in  full,  for  it  brings  into  view 
the  sentiment  which  forms  the  base  of  all  these  pas- 
sages: "And  of  thy  goodness  slay  mine  enemies, 
and  destroy  all  them  that  vex  my  soul,  for  I  am 
thy  servant^  If  we  put  these  words  into  para- 
phrase, the  Psalmist  pleads  that  he  is  engaged  in 
the  service  of  God;  that  in  this  service  he  is  as- 
sailed and  hindered;  that,  powerless  in  himself,  he 
appeals  to  the  source  of  power;  and  that  he  in- 
vokes upon  the  assailants  and  hinderers  of  the 
Divine  work  the  Divine  vengeance,  even  to  their 
extinction. 

We  have,  then,  to  consider  these  denunciatory 
passages,  first,  as  they  were  employed  by  their 
authors ;  secondly,  as  they  are  now  presented  to  us 


192  THE  PSALMS. 

for  our  own  use  in  the  services  of  the  Church  or 
in  private  devotion. 

Under  the  first  head,  let  me  observe  as  follows. 
There  is  not  one  of  these  passages  which  tampers 
with  truth  or  justice;  they  are  aimed  only  at  sin, 
to  blast  and  wither  it.  "  Lead  me,  O  Lord,  in  thy 
righteousness,  because  of  mine  enemies "  (Psa. 
5  :  8).  This  is  the  universal  strain.  All  these 
passages  are  strokes  delivered  with  the  sword  of 
righteousness,  in  its  unending  warfare  with  iniquity. 
Nor  is  there  one  among  them  of  which  it  can  be 
shown  that  it  refers  to  any  personal  feud,  passion, 
or  desire.  Everywhere  the  Psalmist  speaks  in  the 
name  of  God,  on  behalf  of  his  word  and  will. 

But  it  may  still  be  urged  that  such  denunciations 
are  excessive  in  degree,  that  they  are  too  severe  and 
savage,  and  that  they  are  not  suitable  for  the  mouth 
of  man. 

With  respect  to  their  severity,  I  suggest,  and  if 
need  be  contend,  that  we,  in  our  ignorance  and 
weakness,  are  no  fit  judges  of  the  extent  to  which 
the  wisdom  of  the  Almighty  may  justly  carry  the 


THE  PSALMS.  1 93 

denunciation,  even  by  the  mouth  of  man,  and  the 
punishment  of  guilt. 

Man,  and  even  civilized  man,  contemplates  with 
much  equanimity  the  taking  of  human  life  for  the 
occasions  which  he  deems  sufficient.  He  knows 
that  in  all  wars  one  party  must  be  guilt}-,  and  that 
in  most  or  many  wars  neither  have  had  a  justifica- 
tion for  the  wholesale  bloodshed  which  floods  the 
path  of  destruction  that  they  necessarily  follow. 
Life,  which  man  did  not  give  and  cannot  restore, 
he  takes  away,  for  the  repression  of  crime,  with 
general,  though  not  unanimous,  approval.  It  is 
also  taken,  even  now,  in  most  Christian  countries, 
through  duels  for  private  injury  or  insult;  and  it  is 
but  recently  that  public  opinion  in  our  own  country 
has  become  repugnant  to  the  practice.  But  the  scru- 
ples, which  for  ourselves  we  so  easily  thrust  aside, 
become  active,  feverish,  and  even  violent,  when,  in 
a  world  to  the  abundant  wickedness  of  which  our 
own  practice  witnesses,  the  Ruler  of  that  world,  who 
gave  life  for  use,  and  who  sees  and  judges  its  abuse, 

is  to  be  arraigned  before  our  mock  tribunal;  and 

13 


194  THE  PSALMS. 

we,  who  cannot  and  do  not  rightly  guide,  each  of 
us,  our  own  action,  are  to  undertake  to  determine 
his.  And  this,  when  we  have  not  fully  learned,  and 
cannot  measure,  either  the  deep  and  frightful  de- 
pravity of  the  Canaanitish  nations  or  the  purposes 
with  which  Penalty  descends  from  on  high.  We 
know  not  whether  it  comes  in  mercy  to  correct  the 
growth  of  evil  before  it  shall  become  incurable,  and 
whether,  or  how  far,  when  opportunity  has  been  ex- 
hausted here,  resources  may  still  have  been  held  in 
reserve  on  behalf  of  persons  placed  as  they  were, 
to  be  expended  for  good  in  the  great  Elsewhere. 
To  pronounce  verdicts  upon  these  terrible  denun- 
ciations may  be  impious  •  and  is  surely,  at  the  least, 
unreasonable. 

"And  who  art  thou,  that  on  the  bench  would  sit, 
To  judge  what  is  a  thousand  miles  removed, 
With  the  brief  vision  of  a  single  span?"i 

There  is  certainly  more  claim  to  substance  in  the 
objection  which  urges  that  these  denunciations  are 
unsuitable  for  man.     But  here  I  should  interpose 

iDante,  "  Parad."  XIX.,  8i.     Pollock's  translation. 


THE  PSALMS.  1 95 

the  question,  To  what  man  ?  The  wonderful  nature 
in  which  we  have  been  created  is  in  nothing  more 
wonderful  than  in  the  diversity  of  the  conditions 
under  which  it  has  to  subsist  and  work,  on  its  road 
from  embryo  to  perfection.  As  those  stages  accu- 
mulate, the  moral  code  becomes  multiform  and 
involved.  In  simpler  forms  of  life,  and  in  earlier 
stages  of  society,  the  roads  between  right  and 
WTong  were  short,  broad,  and  clear;  like  as  were 
then  the  dividing  spaces  of  the  battle-field,  whereas 
contending  hosts  are  now  severed  by  miles,  and 
almost  leagues,  from  one  another. 

But,  further,  the  Psalmists,  and  the  nation  to 
which  they  belonged,  lived  under  a  different  dis- 
pensation from  ours.  If  we  accept  the  Scriptures, 
that  nation  held  a  divine  commission  to  establish 
the  right  and  to  put  down  the  wrong,  in  a  sense  in 
which  no  such  commission  is  now  given.  For  us 
it  is  enough  to  hope  that  at  any  given  juncture  we 
may  be  doing  the  will  of  God;  but  what  we  hope, 
they  knew;  and  sight  for  them  was  mixed  with 
faith  in  a  degree  and  mode  remote  from  the  spirit 


196  THE  PSALMS. 

of  our  later,  and  in  this  respect,  perhaps,  higher 
training.  They  were  accustomed  to  what  may  be 
termed  short  accounts  with  the  Divine  Justice;  and 
to  reward  or  suffering  as  the  immediate  conse- 
quences, and,  therefore,  as  the  direct  attestations, 
of  the  judgment  of  God  upon  the  moral  conduct 
of  man.  The  responsibility,  which  is  for  us  diffused 
and  indefinite,  was  for  them  concentrated  and  pal- 
pable. But,  besides  this,  they  had  the  great  stand- 
ing institution  of  prophecy;  and  the  king  in  whose 
ears  Nathan's  words  had  thundered,  "Thou  art  the 
man,"  might  well  feel  that  his  own  contact  was  a 
close  one  with  the  mind  of  the  Almighty,  and  that 
he  might  upon  occasion  speak  his  very  strongest 
words  under  guidance  from  on  high. 

I  do  not  pursue  farther  these  remarks,  which  are 
no  more  than  tentative  and  approximate.  But  I 
do  not  find  myself  justified  in  the  assumption  that 
we  are  in  all  cases  to  have  a  complete  cognizance 
of  the  conditions  under  which  the  Psalms  give 
judgment  upon  the  unrighteous,  or  are  intended  to 
arrive  at  final  judgments  on  the  question  what  the 


THE  PSALMS.  197 

Jews  might,  and  what  they  might  not,  suitably  be 
commissioned  by  the  Almighty  to  denounce. 

More  immediately  are  we  concerned  in  the 
question  as  to  the  place  held  in  Christian  devotion, 
and  especially  in  public  ritual,  by  the  denunciatory 
passages  of  the  Psalms.  It  is  one  question  what 
these  denunciations  were  for  the  Jew  ;  it  is  another, 
and  entirely  distinct,  what  they  are  for  us.  But 
the  answer  to  this  objection,  I  apprehend,  lies  near 
to  hand.  All  scruple,  at  least  all  rational  or  plausi- 
ble scruple  in  this  matter,  seems  to  rest  upon  the 
supposition  that  the  passages  are  aimed  at  creatures, 
who  have  characters  mixed  between  good  and  evil, 
and  who  therefore  are  not  presumptively  fit  subjects 
for  our  unmixed,  undiscriminating  denunciation. 
But  can  any  one  reasonably  suppose  that  these 
declarations  are,  in  the  mind  and  sense  of  the 
Christian  Church,  directed  against  any  human 
enemy  ?  Our  human  enemies,  if  we  are  so  unhappy 
as  to  have  any,  are  not  the  most  watchful,  the  most 
subtle,  the  most  destructive,  of  our  foes.  "  For  we 
wrestle  not  against  flesh  and  blood,  but  against 


198  THE  PSALMS. 

,  .  .  the  rulers  of  the  darkness  of  this  world " 
(Eph.  6  :  12).  But  the  Holy  Scripture  and  the 
Christian  religion  teach,  and  our  human  experience 
largely  testifies,  that  there  are  spirits  whose  meat 
and  drink,  so  to  speak,  it  is  to  extend  the  domain 
of  evil,  to  deepen  corruption,  to  destroy  happiness 
by  destroying  innocence,  which  is  its  base ;  to  add 
both  in  range  and  in  intensity  to  the  misery  and 
the  sin  which  have  made  the  world  so  sad.  If  this 
be  so,  then  I  contend  that- to  pray  for  the  abolition 
or  paralysis  of  their  work  and  of  its  agents,  and 
this  especially  when  we  meet  as  Christians  to  set 
forth  solemnly  the  collective  needs  and  aspirations 
of  mankind,  is  a  practice  which  speaks  for  itself, 
and  requires  neither  justification  nor  apology. 

Apart  altogether  from  the  question,  what  may  be 
the  value  or  completeness  of  the  foregoing  defen- 
sive suggestions,  I  would  remind  my  readers  that 
they  relate  not  to  the  main  body  of  the  question 
respecting  the  Psalms,  but  to  a  portion  of  it  which 
is  limited  and  exceptional.  The  Psalms,  like  other 
productions,  is  to  be  judged  by  their  general  char- 


THE  PSALMS.  199 

acter.     I  do  not  perceive  how,  if  we  approach  this 
question  on  the  grounds  and  in  the  spirit  of  reason, 
it  is  possible  for  a  person  so  approaching  it  to  set 
aside  the  mass  of  evidence,  which  estabUshes  the 
unparalleled  and  unapproached  position  of  the  book 
in   its   antiquity   and   use,  in    its    pure   and    noble 
theolog}^  and  in  a  moral  and  spiritual  character 
witnessed  afresh  by  the  judgment  and  practice  of 
each  succeeding  age.     And,  if  the  several  parts  of 
this  evidence  link  themselves  into  a  compact  and 
harmonious  whole,  it  is  not  reason,  but  unreason  in 
the   mask   of  reason,  which   declines   or  omits  to 
acknowledge  the  presumption  thence  arising,  that 
the  Book  is  at  a  level  indefinitely  higher  than  has 
been  reached  by  the  unassisted  faculties  of  man, 
and  that  the  power  which  raised  it  to  that  level  can 
only  be  Divine.     Such  a  conclusion  will   survive 
even  the  approving  reference  in  Psalm  137  :  9  to  a 
practice  of  savage  warfare.     Were  it  true  that  the 
image  of  gold  had  feet  of  clay,  we  might  indeed  be 
perplexed  by  the  combination ;  but  would  not  this 
be  just,  as  we  often  are  perplexed  by  other  combi- 


200  THE  PSALMS. 

nations,  presented  to  us  in  the  providential  govern- 
ment of  the  world  ?  And  not  only  in  the  provi- 
dential government  of  the  world,  but  in  the  fulfil- 
ment of  our  personal  relations  with  other  men. 
Yet  we  do  not  put  an  end  on  that  account  to  such 
relations  :  nor  do  we  cease  to  believe  in  God  because 
we,  such  as  we  are — God  save  the  mark — cannot 
comprehend  the  reason,  or  even  discern  the  right- 
fulness, of  all  he  does.  In  like  manner,  so  neither 
can  we  refuse  to  admit  sufficient  evidence  of  an 
origin  more  than  human  for  the  Psalms  on  the 
ground  that  we  see  only  through  a  glass  darkly, 
and  that  they  present  incidental  features  analogous 
in  principle  to  those  which  in  other  departments  our 
experience  brings  before  us. 


V. 

THE  MOSAIC  LEGISLATION, 


The  legislative  Books  of  the  Pentateuch,  from 
Exodus  to  Deuteronomy,  may  be  contemplated  in 
the  light,  either  (i)  of  their  credentials,  or  (2)  of 
their  character  and  contents. 

The  Christian  Church,  which  had  heretofore 
regarded  them  as  an  integral  and  instructive  part 
of  the  Divine  Revelation,  is  now  challenged  by 
the  voices  of  numerous  critics  to  defend  them. 
Champions  in  this  cause  are  not  wanting ;  and  it 
is  not  to  be  supposed  that  the  learned  in  linguistic 
studies  have  arrived  at  unanimous  and  final  con- 
clusions in  these  grave  matters.  If  we  compare 
their  studies,  as  to  unanimity,  continuity,  and 
ascertained  progress,  with  that  of  the  natural 
sciences,  the  comparison  will  be  not  at  all  to  their 

advantage.     Their  services  are  not,  however,  to  be 

201 


202  THE  MOSAIC  LEGISLA  TION. 

unduly  disparaged.  What  is  understood  to  be  at 
issue  is,  the  date  and  authorship  of  the  Books  in 
the  form  in  which  we  now  have  them.  These  are 
contested  by  the  negative  school  on  grounds  of 
language  and  style,  upon  which  none  can  properly 
attempt  to  follow  or  to  judge  them,  unless  when 
equipped  with  the  same  special  knowledge.  They 
also  allege,  as  parts  of  the  destructive  argument, 
that  the  Books  contain  anachronisms,  contradic- 
tions, statements  disproved  by  history. 

They  have  recently  been  challenged  by  Dr.  Cave^ 
to  set  forth  a  plain  and  distinct  statem.ent  of  these 
difficulties,  such  as  might  bring  the  allegations  in 
some  degree  within  the  circles  of  knowledge  and 
of  judgment,  for  us  who  are  not  experts,  but  are 
supposed  to  be  endued  with  ordinaiy  intelligence. 
They  are  also  invited  to  state  what  meaning  they 
assign  to  the  standing  phrase,  "And  the  Lord  spake 
unto  Moses,"  which  with  its  variants  occurs,  it  may 
be  observed,  no  less  than  thirty  times  in  the  twenty- 
seven  chapters  of  Leviticus.     And,  finally,  they  are 

1  Contemporary  Review,  April,  1890,  pp.  537-551. 


THE  MOSAIC  LEGISLA  TION.  203 

invited  by  Dr.  Cave  to  show  in  plain  terms  the 
reasons  why  it  is  unreasonable  to  suppose  that  the 
Books  (either  in  their  present  state  or  otherwise) 
were  contemporaneous  with  the  events  described, 
and  grew  up  one  by  one  along  with  those  events. 
It  seems  but  common  equity  that  we,  who  stand 
outside  the  learned  world,  and  who  find  operations 
are  in  progress,  which  are  often  declared  to  have 
destroyed  the  authority  of  these  ancient  books, 
should  be  supplied,  as  far  as  may  be,  with  available 
means  of  rationally  judging  the  nature  and  grounds 
of  the  impeachment.  And  it  is  unfortunate  that 
this  has  been  little  thought  of;  and  that,  while  we 
are,  it  may  almost  be  said,  drenched  with  the  de- 
ductions and  conclusions  of  the  negative  critics,  it 
is  still  so  difficult,  in  multitudes  of  instances,  to 
com.e  at  any  clear  view  of  the  grounds  on  which 
they  build.  The  matters  of  style  and  language  we 
must  contentedly  take  upon  trust ;  but  anachronism, 
contradiction  of  history,  contradiction  in  the  Books 
themselves,  ought  to  be  more  or  less  within  our 
cognizance.     And   there   are   many  arguments  of 


204  THE  MOSAIC  LEG  IS  LA  TION. 

historical  verisimilitude  and  likelihood,  which  are 
in  no  sense  the  exclusive  property  of  specialism. 

Even  within  the  compass  of  the  Torah,  a  distinc- 
tion has  been  drawn  by  some  eminent  critics  (by 
Eichhorn,  for  example),  in  their  writings  on  the 
canon  of  the  Old  Testament;^  who  have  assigned 
the  legislative  portions  to  Moses  himself,  and  the 
historical  parts  to  scribes  acting  under  his  direc- 
tion, or  at  a  later  time.  It  does  not  appear  easy  to 
show  why  this  singular  intermixture  of  the  two 
should  have  been  made,  unless  by  or  under  the 
direction  of  the  lawgiver  himself.  The  tangled 
occupations  of  his  evidently  hard-pressed  life  would 
account  for  a  form  of  authorship,  which  is  not  in 
itself  at  all  convenient.  But  the  ordinary  reader 
will  not  fail  to  observe  that  it  is  the  legislation,  for 
which  in  the  sacred  text  itself  the  claim  is  con- 
stantly made  of  being  due  to  direct  communication 
from  above,^  while  no  corresponding  assertion  in 

1  A  most  convenient  summary  of  the  history  of  critical  opinion  on 
the  Pentateuch  is  suppHed  by  Bleek  cum  Wellhausen  in  the  Einleifung 
(ed.  1886),  sects.  13-17.  Wellhausen  adds  another  review  at  the 
close  of  the  volume  in  this  edition. 

2  So  Wellhausen  in  the  Einleitung,  sect.  18,  p.  40. 


THE  MOSAIC  LEGISLA  TION.  20$ 

general  accompanies  the  historical  recitals.  Speak- 
ing at  large,  every  imaginable  difference  has  pre- 
vailed among  the  critics  themselves  as  to  the 
source,  date,  and  authorship  of  the  books.  But 
on  the  whole,  the  negative  movement  has  become 
bolder  in  its  assertions  as  it  proceeded,  and  has 
brought  them  gradually  towards  later  epochs :  to 
Samuel,  to  the  age  of  David,  to  the  severance  of 
the  kingdoms,  to  Josiah,  to  the  Captivity,  and  even 
to  those  who  followed  it.  The  affirmative  side  has 
been  also  stoutly  maintained,^  not  without  the  ad- 
mission of  particular  additions  and  interpolations 
in  the  received  text.  The  distinction  between  sub- 
stantial authorship  and  final  editorship  has  been 
largely  recognized  by  writers  of  celebrity  and 
weight.  Bleek  himself,  sustained  by  Wellhausen 
as  late  as  1886,  held  that  Moses  had  a  hand  {eincn 
anthcil)  in  the  legislative  books.  Many  of  the  laws, 
they  say  at  that  date,  are  without  sense  or  pur- 
pose, except  in  regard  to  circumstances  which 
disappeared  with  the  Mosaic  period.^     Several  sec- 

iSo  Wellhausen  in  the  Einleitung,  sect.  15.      2  md.,  sect.  11. 


206  THE  MOSA IC  LEGISLA  TION. 

tions  of  this  important  work^  are  given  to  the  in- 
dication of  portions  of  the  books  which  must  have 
been  Mosaic.  Further,  we  have  this  remarkable 
declaration.  Though  the  entire  Pentateuch  in  its 
present  form  should  not  have  been  the  work  of 
Moses,  and  though  many  laws  are  the  product 
of  a  later  age,  still  the  legislation,  in  its  spirit  and 
character  as  a  whole,  is  genuinely  Mosaic;^  and 
that,  in  dealing  with  the  Pentateuch,  we  stand,  at 
least  as  to  the  three  middle  books,  Upon  historical 
ground,^  evidently  meaning  upon  historical  ground 
as  opposed  to  that  which  is  unauthenticated  or 
legendary.  Further,  what  is  thus  generally  as- 
serted of  the  spirit  and  character  of  the  Penta- 
teuchal  laws,  is  asserted  for  an  important  share  of 
them*  as  to  both  the  contents,  and  even  the  form. 

These  statements — it  would  not  be  fair  to  call 
them  admissions — go  to  the  root  of  the  whole 
matfer,  and  seem  to  leave  us  in  possession  of  that 

1  Einleitung,  sects.  13-24.  | 

^"  So  mnss  dock  die  darin  enthaltene  gesetzgebung  ihrem  ganzen 
^■eisie  und  character  nach  echt  mosaisch  seyn." — Ibid.,  sect,  22,  p.  45. 
8  Ibid.  *  Ibid.,  sect.  23,  p.  46. 


THE  MOSAIC  LEGISLA  TION,  20/ 

for  which  alone  I  contend ;  namely,  that  the  heart 
and  substance  of  the  legislative  and  institutional 
system  delivered  to  us  in  the  Pentateuch  is  histori- 
cally trustworthy.  If  this  be  so,  it  still  remains 
highly  important  to  distinguish  by  critical  ex- 
amination what,  if  any,  particular  portions  of  the 
work  in  their  actual  form  may  be  open  to  question, 
either  as  secondary  errors,  or  as  developments  ap- 
pended to  the  original  formation ;  but  the  citadel, 
so  long  victoriously  held  by  faith  and  reason,  both 
through  Hebrew  and  through  Christian  ages,  re- 
mains unassailed,  and  the  documents  of  Holy  Writ 
emerge  substantially  unhurt  from  the  inquisitive 
and  searching  analysis  of  the  modern  time. 

There  is  a  later  work  of  Wellhausen's  ("  Die  com- 
position des  Hexateuch's  und  der  Historischen 
Biicher"  (Berlin,  1889),  which  minutely  subdivides 
the  Books  into  smaller  portions,  and  refers  these 
to  their  different  authors,  with  a  self-reliance  which 
appears  to  be  remarkable,  but  of  which  I  am  not  a 
fit  judge.  I  may  observe,  however,  that  this  work 
has  neither  introduction  nor    conclusion,   neither 


208  THE  MOSAIC  LEG  1  SLA  TION. 

index  nor  table  of  contents,  and  that  it  resembles 
rather  the  promiscuous  gatherings  of  a  note-book, 
or  rather,  of  two  note-books  crossing  one  another, 
discharged  bodily  into  a  printing-office,  than  a 
work  of  regular  or  scientific  criticism.  I  must  add 
that  in  certain  cases,  where  the  unity  of  the  text  is 
disputed  upon  grounds  alike  cognizable  by  us  all,  I 
find  the  conclusions  of  the  author  as  disputable  as 
they  are  confident.  In  other  instances,  numerous 
enough,  assertions  are  made,  as  if  they  were  oracles, 
without  the  slightest  explanation,  or  any  indication 
of  their  grounds.  Examples  of  these  methods  may 
be  found  in  the  criticisms  ^  on  Genesis,  and  in  the 
contradiction  alleged  to  exist  in  the  several  accounts 
of  Caleb  and  Joshua  (Num.  32  :  5  and  Deut.  I  : 

32-38). 

A  still  more  negative  utterance,  if  I  understand 
it  rightly,  is  found  in  the  "  Prolegomena  to  the 
History  of  Israel,"  translated  under  the  author's 
supervision,  and  accompanied  with  his  article  on 
Israel   from   the  Encyclopcedia  Britannica?      This 

1  Page  7.  2  Edinburgh  ;  A.  &  C.  Black.   1885. 


THE  MOSAIC  LEG  IS  LA  TION.  20g 

book,  published  since  the  edition  of  Bleek  cum 
Wellhausen  from  which  I  have  quoted,  appears  in 
a  singular  manner  to  contradict  it,  and  announces 
that  "  the  Mosaic  history  is  not  the  starting-point 
for  the  history  of  ancient  Israel,  but  for  the  history 
of  Judaism."  ^  The  distinction  may  not  be  familiar 
to  English  readers,  but  the  meaning  seems  to  be 
that  the  Pentateuch  had  not,  either  in  form  or  sub- 
stance, any  operative  existence  until  after  the  Exile, 
when  the  ancient  Israel  is  held  to  end,  and  Judaism 
to  begin.  A  "  Mosaic  germ  "  only  is  admitted ;  and 
a  germ  is  that  which,  like  an  unborn  child,  has  no 
operativ^e  existence,  but  only  the  promise  of  pro- 
ducing one.  According,  then,  to  the  showing  of 
those  who  tender  themselves  as  our  guides,  Israel 
lived  on  for  nine  hundred  years,  from  the  Exodus, 
and  transmitted  a  peculiar  faith,  law,  ritual,  and 
nationality,  without  any  legislative  and  consti- 
tutional system  to  uphold  any  one  of  them.  This 
very  startling  proposition  appears  to  me  to  do 
violence  to  reason  not  less  glaringly  than  any  of 

1  Preface  by  Professor  Robertson  Smith,  p.  v. 
14 


2 1 0  THE  MOSA IC  LEG  IS  LA  TION. 

the  assertions  ventured  by  the  theologians  in  the 
days  of  their  pride  and  power.  Those  writers  are 
doubtless  perfectly  sincere,  who  represent  this  as  a 
method  of  progressive  revelation.  But  there  are 
also  persons  who  think  that  such  a  progressive 
revelation  as  this  would  for  over  two  thousand 
years  have  palmed  upon  the  whole  Jewish  and 
Christian  world  not  only  a  heartless,  but  an  im- 
possible imposture.  It  is  more  immediately 
necessary  to  observe  that  the  hypothesis  is  one 
reaching  far  beyond  the  province  of  specialism, 
and  requiring  to  be  tested  at  a  number  of  points 
by  considerations  more  broadly  historical.  Nor 
can  I  quit  the  subject  without  observing  that  it  is 
extremely  difficult  to  learn  whether  there  exists  any 
real  standing-ground,  which  the  present  negative 
writers  mean  not  only  to  occupy  but  to  hold. 
Almost  any  representation  of  their  views  may  be 
either  supported  or  contradicted  by  citing  particular 
expressions  from  their  works.  All  we  can  do  is  to 
dive  as  best  we  may  into  their  conception  of  what 
Wellhausen  rather  singularly  calls  "  the  secrets"  of 


THE  MOSAIC  LEG  IS  LA  TiON.  2 1 1 

his  art.^  Upon  the  whole,  and  taldng  the  article  on 
Israel  in  the  EncyclopcEdia  Britannic  a  as  the  fairest 
exposition  of  his  views,  I  infer  that  the  present  fashion 
is  to  believe  in  Moses,  but  to  question  even  his  con- 
nection with  the  Decalogue;^  to  allow  him  to  have 
given  or  suggested  a  something,  totally  indefinite 
in  its  character,  to  the  Israelites ;  and  to  hold  that 
the  materials  oi  the  legislative  books  gradually  grew 
up  out  of  material  supplied  upon  occasion  by  the 
priests  (like  the  "  Answers  of  Experts,"  ^  which  sup- 
plied a  contribution  to  the  Code  of  Justinian)  into 
a  state  which  enabled  editors,  generally  post-exilic, 
to  reduce  them  to  their  present  form.  This  scheme 
seems  to  be  admirably  represented  by  the  words 
which  Mr.  Robertson  Smith  quotes,  on  his  ov/n 
very  high  authority,  as  its  gist.  And  this  is  the 
scheme  to  which  I  desire,  on  historical  grounds,  to 
demur. 

At  the  same  time  it  is  undeniable  that,  even  if 
the  outside  negative  conclusions  were  still  such  as 

1  Einleitung,  Ed.  1886,  Vorwort. 

^Wellhausen,  Hist.  Israel  {Black\  pp.  436,  509. 

3 Gibbon  (Milman's  ed.),  IV.  193. 


2 1 2  THE  MOSA IC  LEG  IS  LA  TION, 

they  were  stated  to  be  so  lately  as  in  1886,  yet  the 
impression  they  had  created  was  not  of  a  similarly 
limited  character.  Whether  owing  to  the  predis- 
positions of  the  time,  or  to  a  spirit  latent  in  some 
of  the  critics,  or  to  the  reaction  which  is  usually 
perceptible  when  certain  ideas  long  cherished  on 
one  side  have  been  found  to  require  modification, 
there  have  been,  as  it  were,  exhalations  from  the 
recent  inquiries,  extending  outwards  in  their  effect 
much  beyond  the  positive  conclusions.  An  atmo- 
sphere has  been  diffused  around  us,  and  we  habitu- 
ally inhale  it,  which  inspires  a  general  uncertainty, 
leading  to  negation,  with  respect  to  the  Mosaic 
books.  This  causes  us,  not,  perhaps,  to  believe 
(for  this  would  imply  and  demand  a  rational  pro- 
cess), but  to  feel  towards  these  great  foundation- 
books  as  if  we  believed  that,  instead  of  being  as  to 
the  heart  and  pith  of  them  trustworthy,  they  were 
in  the  main  untrustworthy;  that  they  were  com- 
pounded  or  composed  at  uncertain  tim.es,  by  un- 
certain authors,  from  uncertain  materials  ;  that  even 
bad  faith   is  to  be  traced  in   them;  and  that  the 


THE  MOSA IC  LEGISLA  TION.  2 1 3 

question  is  not  so  much  what  particulars  can  be 
convicted  of  unauthenticity,  as  whether  any  par- 
ticulars can  be  rescued  from  the  general  discredit 
of  a  mythical  or  legendary  inception.  It  is  against 
this  vague,  irrational,  unscientific  method  of  pro- 
ceeding that  I  would  enter  not  a  protest  only,  but  a 
pleading.  Whatever  is  to  happen,  let  not  Chris- 
tians lose  unawares  either  their  faith,  or  that  pillar 
of  their  faith  which  the  great  books  of  the  Old 
Testament  always  have  supplied. 

I  have  already  made  it  clear  that  I  yield,  as  a 
matter  of  course,  to  the  conclusions  of  linguists  in 
their  own  domain,  not  only  respectful  attention,  but 
provisional  assent.  That  domain  includes  not  only 
criticism  strictly  textual,  but  all  that  relates  to  style, 
and,  in  a  word,  whatever  properties  of  any  given 
writings  are  developed  through  the  medium  of  the 
particular  tongue  in  which  they  are  composed.  On 
the  mere  form  of  the  Books  they  speak  with  a  force 
which,  as  against  us,  the  unlearnecJ,  is  overv/helm- 
ing.  But,  in  the  exam.inations  directed  to  the 
matter  as  opposed  to  the  form,  their  authority  is 


214  THE  MOSAIC  LEGISLA  TION. 

of  a  less  stringent  character,  and  may  even  decline 
to  zero.  The  historical  aspects  and  relations  which 
open  out  this  field  are  not  theirs  exclusively,  and 
we  may  canvass  and  question  their  conclusions, 
just  as  it  is  open  to  us  to  proceed  with  the  conclu- 
sions of  Macaulay  or  of  Grote. 

When  it  is  attempted  to  bring  down  the  date  of 
the  Pentateuch  from  the  time  of  Moses,  by  whom 
the  books  in  various  forms  purport^  to  have  been 
composed,  to  the  period  of  the  Babylonian  cap- 
tivity, and  this  not  only  as  to  their  literary  form,  but 
as  to  their  substance,  the  evident  meaning  and  effect 
of  the  attempt  is  to  divest  them  of  an  historical, 
and  to  invest  them  with  a  legendary  character. 

At  the  same  time,  it  should  be  borne  in  mind 
that  those  who  have  not  seen  reason  to  adopt  the 
negative  theory  above  described,  leave  entirely  open 

1  For  instance,  as  by  the  proem  to  Deuteronomy  (Deut.  i  :  i) ;  the  re- 
cited orders  of  the  Almighty  to  Moses  that  he  should  speak,  followed 
by  the  speeches,  e.g..  Lev.  i  :  i,  Num.  i  :  i ;  the  constant  verbal  report 
of  words  spoken  to  Moses  when  no  other  person  (or  in  some  cases 
Aaron  only)  was  present;  and  the  remarkable  and  high-toned  injunc- 
tions in  the  later  chapters  of  Deuteronomy  which  all  through  seem  to 
have  reference  to  a  gpde  of  legislation  preceding  them. 


THE  MOSA IC  LEGISLA  TION.  2 1 5 

numerous  questions  belonging  to  the  institutions 
of  the  Israelites.  It  is  not  extravagant  to  assume 
that  laws  given  to  them  as  a  nomad  people,  and 
then  subjected  to  the  varying  contingencies  of  his- 
tory during  many  centuries,  may,  or  even  must,  have 
required  and  received  adaptation  by  supplement, 
development,  or  change  in  detail,  which  the  ap- 
pointed guides  of  the  people  were  authorized  and 
qualified  to  supply,  not  in  derogation,  but  rather 
in  completion  and  in  furtherance  of  the  work  of 
Moses,  which  might  still  remain  his  in  essence 
from  first  to  last 

It  is  admitted,  however,  that  the  whole  question 
must  be  tried  on  historical  and  literary  grounds. 
On  such  grounds  I  seek  to  approach  it,  and  to 
throw  light  upon  it  from  some  considerations  of 
reason  and  probability,  which  appear  to  me  to  be 
of  not  inconsiderable  cogency.  By  testing  the  sub- 
ject in  this  way,  vv'e  may  come,  in  part  at  least,  to 
learn  by  testing  what  in  the  main  is  fact,  what  in 
the  main  is  speculation,  and  to  a  great  extent  fluc- 
tuating and  changeful  speculation. 


2 1 6  THE  MOSA IC  LEGISLA  TION. 

First,  it  is  never  to  be  forgotten,  that  our  point 
of  departure  is  from  the  ground  of  established  his- 
toric fact.  The  existence  of  Moses  is  even  better 
and  far  better  established  than  that  (for  example) 
of  Lycurgus,  We  know  Lycurgus  in  the  main 
from  the  one  great  fact  of  his  very  peculiar  institu- 
tions. They,  such  as  we  find  them  in  historic 
times,  compel  us  to  presume  his  existence  in  a 
prehistoric  time.  .  Not  only  their  high  and  elabo- 
rate organization,  but  their  practical  efficacy  in 
separating  and  fencing  off  from  the  rest  of  Greece 
the  Spartan  community,  reduces  to  something  near 
absurdity  any  such  supposition  as  that  they  were 
essentially  no  more  than  a  late  growth  reached  by 
imperceptible  degrees.  We  know  Moses  as  well 
from  his  institutions,  which  are  by  no  means  less 
peculiar,  and  which,  as  experience  has  shown,  have 
been  very  far  more  durable.  In  the  case  of  Moses, 
it  happens  that  we  have  much  evidence  indepen- 
dent of,  and  anterior  to,  the  institutions  themselves 
in  their  historic  form.  Yet  no  one  doubts  either 
the  existence  of  the  Spartan  lawgiver,  or  the  general 


THE  MOSA IC  LEGISLA  TION.  2 1 7 

character  of  his  persopxal  work.  If  the  form  of  the 
books  in  which  the  Mosaic  legislation  reaches  us 
be  open  to  the  suspicion  of  manipulation  by  scribes 
or  editors,  or  if  it  suggest  some  suspicion  of  de- 
velopments, how  does  this  com^pare  with  the  case 
of  Lycurgus  ?  About  or  from  jiim  we  have  no 
books  at  all ;  and  yet  it  v/ould  be  deemed  irra- 
tional to  doubt  either  the  existence  of  the  man,  or 
the  substance  of  the  work  perform.ed  by  him."" 

The  exodus  from  Egypt,  the  settlement  in  Pales- 
tine, the  foundation  there  of  institutions,  civil  and 
religious,  which  were  endowed  with  a  tenacity  of 
life  and  a  peculiarity  of  character  beyond  all  ex- 
ample: these  things  are  established  by  Scripture, 
but  they  are  also  established  independent  of  Scrip- 
ture. They  constitute  a  trinoda  Jtecessitas,  a  three- 
fold combination  of  fact,  which,  in  order  to  make 
them  intelligible  and  coherent,  in  order  to  supply 
a  rational  connection  between  cause  and  effect, 
require  not  only  a  Moses,  but  such  a  Moses  as  the 
Scripture  supplies.  They  build  up  a  niche,  which 
the  Scripture  fills.     At  all   times   of  history,  and 


2 1 8  THE  MOSA IC  LEGISLA  TION. 

specially  in  those  primitive  times,  when^  the  men 
made  the  governments,  not  the  governments  the 
men,  these  great  independent  historic  facts  abso- 
lutely carry  with  them  the  assumption  of  a  leader, 
a  governor,  a  legislator.  All  this  simply  means  a 
Moses,  and  a  Moses  such  as  we  know  him  from 
the  Pentateuch. 

And  this  leads  us,  I  do  not  say  to,  but  towards, 
the  conclusion  that  whatever  be  the  disparaging 
allegations  of  the  critics,  they  may  after  all  accord- 
ing to  likelihood  be  found  reasonable  as  to  matters 
of  form  or  of  detail,  but  that  the  substance  of  the 
history  is  in  thorough  accordance  with  the  historic 
bases  that  are  laid  for  us  in  profane  as  well  as  in 
sacred  testimony.  If  this  be  so,  then  we  have  also 
to  bear  in  mind  that  the  phenomenon,  which  we 
have  before  us,  is  one  so  peculiar  that  it  could  only 
have  been  exhibited  to  the  world  as  the  offspring 
of  a  peculiar  generating  cause.  A  people  of  limited 
numbers,  of  no  marked  political  genius,  negative 
and    stationary  as   to   literature  and  art,  maintain 

*So  Montesquieu,  "  Grandeur  et  decadence  des  Remains,"  Chap.  I, 


THE  MOSAIC  LEGISLA  TION.  2 19 

their    absolutely   separate    existence    for    near   a 
thousand   years,   down   to  the   Captivity.       They 
are  placed   in  the    immediate  neighborhood,  and 
subject  to  the  frequent  attacks,  of  the  great  Eastern 
monarchies,  as  well  as  of  some  very  warlike  neigh- 
bors.    These   attacks    compromise   their   political 
independence,   but    do    not    prevent   it   from   be- 
ing   recovered.     They   receive   the   impress   of    a 
character  so  marked  that  not  even  the  Captivity 
can  efface  it;  but,  on  the  contrary,  that  searching 
trial  helps  to  give  a  harder  and  sharper  projection 
to  its  features.     It  retains  its  solidity  and  substance 
while  everything  else,  including  great  political  ag- 
gregations, such  as  the  Hittite  monarchy,  becomes 
gradually  fused  in  the  surrounding  masses;   and 
this  even  when  it  has  been  subjected  to  conditions 
such  as  at  Babylon,  apparently  sufficient  to  beat 
down  and  destroy  the  most  obstinate  nationalism. 
Can  it  be  denied  that  this  great  historic  fact,  no- 
where to  be   matched,  is  in  thorough  accordance 
with,  and  almost  of  itself  compels  us  to  presuppose, 
the  existence,  from  the  outset,  of  an  elaborately  de- 


220  THE  MOSA IC  LEG  IS  LA  TION, 

tailed  and  firmly  compacted  system  of  laws  and 
institutions,  under  which  this  peculiar  discipline 
might  subsist  and  work,  so  as  gradually  to  shape, 
determine,  and  mature  the  character  of  the  people? 
If,  apart  from  all  questions  of  form  and  ex- 
pression, the  substance  of  the  Mosaic  law  was 
given  to  the  Israelites  on  their  settlement  in  Pal- 
estine, such  a  provision,  it  may  fearlessly  be  said, 
was  in  full  accordance  with  the  moral  exigency  of 
the  case,  and  with  the  laws  of  historical  probability. 
If,  on  the  other  hand,  there  was  no  Moses,  or  only 
a  Moses  who  left  nothing  behind  him,  and  who 
does  not  rank  among  the  lawgivers  of  the  world, 
if  the  Legislative  Books  represent  a  gradual  and 
mythical  accretion  due  mainly  either  to  class 
interests  or  to  the  magnifying  effect  of  distance, 
turned  to  account  by  invention  either  interested 
or  credulous,  then  the  hypothesis  presented  to  us 
is,  it  may  surely  be  contended,  in  violent  discord 
with  what,  on  principles  of  providential  government 
or  of  human  good  sense,  the  case  would  usually  be 
held  to  have  required. 


THE  MOSA IC  LEGISLA  TION.  2  2 1 

In  estimating  the  claim  of  the  Old  Testament  to 
a  divine  origin,  it  is  important  to  compare  the  legis- 
lation given  by  Moses  with  that  of  other  ancient 
lawgivers;  such,  for  example,  as  Solon,  who  en- 
joyed the  light  of  a  far  more  advanced  civilization. 
Still,  this  comparison,  if  alone,  would  not  fully 
bring  out  the  reason  of  the  case  ;  we  must  also 
match  the  Hebrew  intellect,  as  measured  by  knowl- 
edge, art,  and  manners,  with  the  corresponding 
conditions  among  the  other  nations  whose  laws 
may  be  brought  into  the  comparison.  For  if,  with 
inferior  tools  and  materials,  a  superior  work  was 
produced,  it  must  surely  be  admitted  that  such  a 
result  suggests,  even  perhaps  of  itself  requires,  the 
supposition  of  some  hidden  aid  which  rectified  the 
disproportion,  and  placed  the  means  in  a  due  rela- 
tion to  the  end.  Now,  among  the  Hebrews  of  the 
period,  there  is  no  sign  as  yet  of  intellectual  pre- 
dominance or  advancement ;  and  that  such  a  man 
as  Moses  should  have  been  raised  up  amongst 
them  is  a  fact  which  of  itself  suggests  and  sus- 
tains the  idea  of  some  altogether  special  and  pecu- 


222  THE  MOSAIC  LEGISLA  TION. 

liar  guidance  exercised  by  the  Almighty  over  the 
selected  people. 

I  cannot  but  think  that,  wherever  we  turn,  we 
seem  to  find  the  broad  and  lucid  principles  of  his- 
toric likelihood  asserting  themselves  in  favor  of  the 
substance  of  the  legislative  books,  apart  from  ques- 
tions of  detail  and  literary  form. 

In  its  great  stages,  we  are  entitled  to  treat  the 
matter  of  the  narrative  books  as  history  entitled  to 
credit.  An  elaborate  organization,  with  a  visible 
head  and  a  hereditary  succession,  is,  after  a  long 
lapse  of  time,  substituted  for  a  regimen  over  Israel, 
of  which  the  mainsprings  had  been  personal  emi- 
nence and  moral  force.  It  is  represented  in  the 
Scripture,  and  it  seems  obvious,  that  the  transition 
from  this  patriarchal  republicanism  to  monarchy 
was  in  the  nature  of  a  religious  retrogression.  It 
showed  an  increasing  incapacity  to  walk  by  faith, 
and  a  craving  for  an  object  of  sight,  as  a  substitute 
for  the  Divine  Majesty  apprehended  by  spiritual 
insight,  and  habitually  conceived  of  by  the  people 
as  the  head  of  the  civil  community.     This  view  of 


THE  MOSAIC  LEGISLA  TION.  Z2^ 

the  relative  condition  of  republican  and  cf  regal 
Israel  is  confirmed  by  the  fact,  on  which  I  have 
already  observed,  that  with  the  monarchy  came  in 
another  regular  organization,  that  of  the  schools 
of  the  prophets.  Prophecy,  which  for  the  present 
purpose  we  may  consider  as  preaching,  instead  of 
appearing  from  time  to  tim.e  as  occasion  required, 
became  a  system,  with  provision  for  perpetual  suc- 
cession. That  is  to  say,  the  people  could  not  be 
kept  up  to  the  primitive,  or  even  the  necessary, 
level  in  belief  and  life,  without  the  provision  of 
more  elaborate  and  direct  means  of  instruction, 
exhortation,  and  reproof,  than  had  at  first  been 
requisite. 

Notwithstanding  the  existence  of  those  means, 
and  the  singular  and  noble  energy  of  the  prophets, 
the  proofs  of  the  decline  are  not  less  abundant  than 
painful  in  the  wickedness  of  most  of  the  sovereigns, 
and  in  the  almost  wholesale  and  too  constant  lapse 
of  the  Israelites  into  the  filthy  idolatry  which  was 
rooted  in  the  country.  And  again,  it  is  not  a  little 
remarkable  that  the  enumeration  by  name  of  the 


224  THE  MOSAIC  LEGISLA  TION, 

gieat  historic  heroes  of  faith,  in  the  Epistle  to  the 
Hebrews,  ends  in  the  person  of  King  David  (Heb. 
II  :  32),  with  the  first  youth  of  the  monarchy.  The 
only  later  instances  referred  to  are  the  prophets, 
named  as  a  class,  who  stood  apart  and  alone,  and 
were  not,  as  a  rule,  leaders  of  the  people,  but  rather 
witnesses  in  sackcloth  against  their  iniquities.  Tak- 
ing the  history  from  the  Exodus  to  the  Exile  as  a 
whole,  the  latter  end  was  worse  than  the  beginning, 
the  cup  of  iniquity  was  full;  it  had  been  filled  by 
a  gradual  process:  and  one  of  the  marks  of  that 
process  was  a  lowering  of  the  method  in  which  the 
chosen  people  were  governed  ;  it  became  more 
human  and  less  divine. 

Under  these  circumstances,  does  it  not  appear 
like  a  paradox,  and  even  a  rather  wanton  paradox, 
to  refer  the  production  of  those  sacred  Mosaic 
books,  which  constituted  the  charter,  and  formed 
the  character,  of  the  Hebrews  as  a  separate  and 
peculiar  people,  to  the  epochs  of  a  lowered  and 
decaying  spiritual  life?  They  surely  formed  the 
base  on  which  the  entire  structure  rested.     It  is 


THE  MOSA IC  LEGISLA  TION.  225 

hardly  possible  to  separate  the  fabric  from  its 
foundation.  Had  they  not  been  recorded  and 
transmitted,  it  would  have  been  reasonable,  per- 
haps necessary,  for  us  to  presume  their  existence. 
They  could  only  spring  from  a  plant  full  of  vigor- 
ous life,  not  from  one  comparatively  sickly  and 
exhausted. 

Again,  we  are  taught  by  the  negative  school  that 
the  portion  of  the  Pentateuch  which  specially  de- 
scribes the  work  of  the  Priest,  and  which  they  term 
the  Priest-Code,  is  of  late  composition,  probably 
the  latest  of  all,  and  has  been  devised  in  the  in- 
terest of  the  priestly  order. 

Now  I  think  that  there  are  ready  means  of  ap- 
plying the  touchstone  to  this  allegation.  It  seems 
the  great  aim  of  the  assailants  to  bring  down  the 
date  of  the  main  contents  of  the  legislative  books 
to  the  Exile  and  the  period  which  follows  it.  Now 
we  have  to  remember  that  the  schools  of  the 
prophets  established  a  caste  which  was  in  profes- 
sional rivalry  with  the  priesthood,  and  which  pre- 
sented every  likelihood  of  being  its  effective  censor. 

15 


226  THE  MOSA IC  LEGISLA  TION. 

We  have  the  written  and,  I  beheve,  unquestioned 
productions  of  this  school  of  prophets,  reaching 
back  into  the  ninth  century  (in  the  Book  of  Amos), 
above  two  hundred  years  before  the  Exile.  The 
relation  of  the  prophet  to  the  priest,  somewhat 
accentuated,  so  to  speak,  by  competing  interests, 
was  in  certain  respects  one  of  superiority;  for, 
while  the  priest  only  administered  in  a  human  way 
a  system  originally  of  Divine  appointment,  the 
prophet  believed  himself  to  speak  under  direct 
inspiration  and  command  from  the  Most  High. 
The  supposition  pressed  upon  us  is  that,  during 
the  period  when  the  books  of  the  Prophets  were 
being  produced,  the  priests  foisted  upon  the  nation 
adulterated,  nay,  rather  forged,  works,  which  they 
audaciously  ascribed  to  Moses,  and  which  they 
shaped  in  the  interests  of  the  sacerdotal  order.  Is 
it  not  quite  plain  that,  if  this  had  been  true,  nay, 
if  it  had  been  so  much  as  an  approach  to  the  truth, 
the  prophets  would,  in  the  interests  of  righteous- 
ness even  more  than  in  their  own,  have  made  use 
of  the  advantages  of  their  position,  and  would  have 


THE  MOSAIC  LEGISLA  TION.  22/ 

held  up  such  a  flagrant  iniquity  of  the  rival  class  to 
infamy  or  rebuke?  Yet  they  do  nothing  of  the 
sort.  And  it  is  not  even  open  to  us  to  refer  this  to 
some  hidden  cause,  as  it  would  have  been  if  we 
could  have  alleged  that,  for  some  undeclared  rea- 
son, it  is  their  habit  to  pass  by  the  conduct  of  the 
priests  in  silence.  For,  on  the  contrary,  they  do 
exercise  the  office  of  reprimand  most  freely.  They 
do  reprove  and  denounce  neglect  of  duty  and  abuse 
of  power  by  the  priests ;  but  they  do  this  exactly 
in  the  same  way  for  the  priestly  order  and  for  their 
own  ;  and,  though  they  could  not  have  been  biased 
against  their  own  schools,  there  is  no  sign  that 
priests  were  more  faulty  than  prophets.  By  way 
of  specimen  of  their  usual  manner,  I  may  quote 
the  prophet  Zephaniah,  who  in  the  following  pass- 
age appears  to  administer  justice  impartially  all 
around: 

"  Her  princes  within  her  are  roaring  lions  ;  her  judges  are 
evening  wolves  ;  they  gnaw  not  the  bones  till  the  morrow. 

"Her  prophets  are  light  and  treacherous  persons:  her 
priests  have  polluted  the  sanctuary,  they  have  done  violence 
to  the  law  "  (Zeph.  3  :  3,  4). 


228  THE  MOSAIC  LEGISLA  TION. 

All  were  human,  all  were  alike.  There  is  no- 
where a  tittle  of  evidence  to  show  the  gross  and 
very  special  offenses  with  which  the  priesthood  are 
now  charged.  In  such  a  case  the  negative  evidence 
carries  positive  force.  It  is  evident,  first,  that  the 
prophets  knew  nothing  of  such  delinquencies  ;  and, 
secondly,  that,  if  they  were  unknown  to  the  prophets 
through  this  long  lapse  of  time,  it  was  because  they 
were  not  committed. 

We  have,  then,  in  the  historic  Moses,  a  great  and 
powerful  genius,  an  organizing  and  constructing 
mind.  Degenerate  ages  cannot  equip  and  furnish 
forth  illustrious  founders,  only  at  the  most  the 
names  and  shadows  of  them.  Moses  belongs  to 
the  class  of  nation-makers  ;  to  a  class  of  men,  who 
have  a  place  by  themselves  in  the  history  of  poli- 
tics, and  who  are  among  the  rarest  of  the  great 
phenomena  of  our  race.  And  he  stands  in  historic 
harmony  with  his  work.  But  we  are  now  some- 
times asked  to  sever  the  work  from  the  worker, 
and  to  refer  it  to  some  doubtful  and  nameless  per- 
son ;  whereas  it  is  surely  obvious  or  probable  that 


THE  MOSA IC  LEGISLA  TION.  229 

the  author  of  a  work  so  wonderful  and  so  far 
beyond  example,  so  elaborate  in  its  essential  struc- 
ture, and  so  designed  for  public  use,  could  hardly 
fail  to  associate  his  name  with  it  as  if  written  upon 
a  rock,  and  with  a  pen  of  iron.  For,  be  it  recol- 
lected, that  name  was  the  seal  and  stamp  of  the 
work  itself  According  to  its  own  testimony  he 
was  the  apostolos  (Exod.  19  :  16-25,  ^^id  passim), 
the  messenger,  who  brought  it  from  God,  and  gave 
it  to  the  people.  If  the  use  of  his  name  was  a 
fiction,  it  was  one  of  those  fictions  which  are  false- 
hoods ;  for  it  altered  essentially  the  character  of 
the  writings  to  which  it  was  attached. 

Supposing  it  to  be  granted  that  this  or  that  por- 
tion of  the  legislative  books  may  have  been  an 
addition,  in  the  way  of  development,  of  an  appen- 
dage and  supplement  to  a  scheme  already  existing, 
how  and  why  came  it  to  be  placed  under  the  shelter 
of  the  great  name  of  Moses,  but  because  that  name 
had  already  acquired  and  consolidated  its  authority, 
from  its  being  inseparably  attached  to  the  original 
gift  of  the  law  ? 


2  30  THE  MOSA IC  LEGISLA  TION. 

Even  so  it  was  that,  when  the  great  and  wonder- 
ful poems  known  as  the  Ihad  and  Odyssey  had 
given  to  the  name  of  Homer  a  surpassing  celebrity, 
and  other  works  of  less  exalted  rank  sought  for 
fame  by  claiming  him  as  their  author,  the  simple 
fact  that  they  so  claimed  him  of  itself  supplied  the 
proof  that  Homer  was  traditionally,  and  from  im- 
memorial time,  taken  to  be  the  author  of  those 
greater  works  at  the  time  when  the  lesser  ones 
were  imputed  to  him.  If  the  tide  of  Mosaic 
authorship  was  ever  in  any  case  attached  to  what 
Moses  did  not  produce,  the  ascription  was  made  in 
order  to  gain  credit  for  the  new  supplemental  mat- 
ter, and  of  itself  proved  that,  at  the  date  when  it 
was  made,  there  was  an  older  and  immemorial 
belief  in  his  being  the  author  of  the  work  whereto 
the  supplement  was  appended. 

As  we  stand  on  historical  ground  in  assuming 
that  Moses  was  a  great  man,  and  a  powerful  agent 
in  the  Hebrew  history,  so  we  stand  on  a  like  basis 
in  pointing  to  the  fact  that,  from  the  Captivity  on- 
wards (I  say  nothing   of  the  prior  period,  as  it 


THE  MOSA IC  LEG  IS  LA  TION.  2  3 1 

would  beg  the  question),  the  Jewish  nation  paid  to 
the  Five  Books  of  the  Pentateuch  a  special  and 
extraordinary  regard,  even  beyond  the  rest  of  their 
sacred  books.  These  were  known  as  the  Torah ; 
and  the  fact  of  this  special  reverence  is  one  so 
generally  acknowledged,  that  it  may  without  dis- 
cussion be  safely  assumed  as  a  point  of  departure. 
Before,  then,  any  sort  of  acceptance  or  acquies- 
cence is  accorded  to  notions  which  virtually  consign 
to  insignificance  the  most  ancient  of  our  sacred 
books,  let  us  well  weigh  the  fact  that  the  devout 
regard  of  the  Hebrews  for  the  Torah  took  the  form, 
at  or  very  soon  after  the  Exile,  of  an  extreme 
vigilance  on  behalf  of  these  particular  books  as 
distinct  from  all  others.  This  vigilance,  which  at 
a  later  epoch  reached  its  climax  under  the  Masso- 
retes,  very  naturally  began,  or  greatly  advanced,  at 
the  time  when  the  nation,  or  its  leading-  classes, 
having  for  the  time  lost  their  temple  and  their 
visible  home,  clung  more  closely  than  ever  to  the 
written  word  in  their  sacred  books;  to  its  body 
either  more,  or  not  less,  than  to  its  spirit. 


232  THE  MOSAIC  LEGISLA  TION. 

So  early  as  in  the  days  of  Hezekiah,  there  is  said 
to  have  been  a  restorative  process  of  some  kind 
performed  upon  the  text  of  the  law,  as  well  as  upon 
the  temple  and  its  doors.^  That  clinging  affection 
to  the  Word,  which  the  Captivity  could  not  fail  to 
stimulate  in  pious  minds,  took  effect,  after  the 
Return,  in  the  establishment  of  positive  institutions 
for  its  care  ;  which,  indeed,  had  become  a  necessity, 
in  consequence  of  the  change  in  the  spoken 
language,  unless  it  were  to  be  wholly  lost  to  the 
people.  Hence  we  have  the  Jewish  tradition  of  a 
Great  Synagogue,  founded  with  this  view.  A  guild 
of  scribes  was  appointed  to  copy,  preserve,  and  ex- 
pound the  Divine  Word,  ^  and  the  Canon  of  the 
Old  Testament  appears  during  the  same  period  to 
have  assumed  something  of  a  regular  form.  Soon 
grew  up  the  Massorah,  or  body  of  traditions  con- 
cerning the  texts  of  the  Torah,  which  is  supposed 
to  have  become  noticeable  from  about  300  B.  C.,* 
and  which  in  after  ages  gave  a  name  to  the  Masso- 

iPaterson  Smyth,  "  The  Old  Documents,"  p.  42.    2  Chron.  29  :  3. 
2  Ibid.,  p.  66.  8  jiid,^  p.  90. 


THE  MOSAIC  LEGJSLA  TION.  233 

retes,  official  students  and  guardians  of  the  text. 
This  body  is  one  without  a  parallel  in  the  history 
of  the  world.  Its  existence  not  only  afforded 
strong  securities  of  a  special  nature  for  the  faithful 
custody  of  the  text  from  the  date  when  its  opera- 
tions commenced,  but  it  also  bears  witness  to  a  pro- 
found and  exacting  veneration  for  the  Ancient 
Books  as  such,  which  seems  to  presuppose  an 
unquestioning  traditional  belief  in  their  antiquity 
and  authenticity. 

The  Jews,  perhaps  exclusively  among  the  early 
peoples,  distinguished  broadly  betw^een  the  matter 
and  the  corporeal  form  of  a  book,  between  its  soul 
and  its  body.  They  alone  conceived  the  idea  of 
using  the  material  form  of  the  words  and  letters  as 
an  instrument  for  ensuring  the  conservation  of  the 
contents.  If  (such  was  their  conception)  we  secure 
the  absolute  identity  of  the  manuscripts,  and  reckon 
up  the  actual  numbers  of  the  words  they  contain, 
and  of  the  letters  which  com.pose  the  words,  then 
we  shall  render  change  in  them  impossible,  and  con- 
servation certain.     Thus,  for  example,  the   words 


234  THE  MOSAIC  LEGISLA  TION. 

in  the  Book  of  Psalms  were  counted,  and  the  mid- 
dle word  of  the  book  was  known.  The  letters  in 
each  word  were  also  counted,  and  the  middle  letter 
was  known.  Rules  for  writing,  placing,  and  arran- 
ging were  laid  down;  readings  were  noted  as  khetibh 
and  keri ;  as  what  was  in  the  text,  and  as  what 
ouorht  to  be  in  the  text  but,  from  a  reverent  unwill- 
ingness  to  alter,  cnly  took  its  place  upon  the 
margin.  The  Hebrews  were  the  only  people  who 
built  up  by  degrees  a  regular  scientific  method  of 
handling  the  material  forms  in  which  the  substance 
of  their  Sacred  Books  was  clothed,  and  this  system 
had  begun  to  grow  from  the  time  when  a  special 
reverence  is  known  to  have  been  concentrated  upon 
the  Torah.  I  will  not  dwell  upon  the  topic  that 
this  peculiarity  of  handling  supplies  of  itself  a 
certain  amount  of  presumption  for  peculiarity  of 
origin.  It  may  have  commenced  before  the 
Captivity.  It  may  have  preceded,  and  may  in  that 
case  probably  have  been  enhanced  by,  the  division 
of  the  kingdoms.  .  It  must  have  been  in  great  force 
when,  soon  after  the  Captivity,  schools  of  scribes 


THE  MOSA IC  LEG  IS  LA  TION.  2  3  5 

were  entrusted  with  the  custody  of  the  text  of  the 
law  as  a  study  apart  from  that  of  its  meaning. 
Now,  in  our  time,  we  are  asked  or  tempted  by  the 
negative  criticism  to  beheve  that  all  this  reverence 
for  the  Books  of  the  Pentateuch,  having  primarily 
the  sense  for  its  object,  but  so  abounding  and  over- 
flowing as  to  embrace  even  the  corporeal  vehicle, 
was  felt  towards  a  set  of  books  not  substantially 
genuine,  but  compounded  and  made  up'  by  oper- 
ators, and  these  recent  operators,  who  may  be  mildly 
called  editors,  but  who  were  rather  clandestine 
authors.  Is  this  a  probable  or  reasonable  hypothe- 
sis ?  Is  it  even  possible  that  these  books  of  re- 
cent concoction,  standing  by  the  side  of  some 
among  the  prophetical  books  possessing  a  much 
greater  antiquit}^,  should  nevertheless  have  attracted 
to  themselves,  and  have  permanently  retained,  an 
exceptional  and  superlative  veneration,  much 
exceeding  that  paid  to  the  oldest  among  the  books 
of  the  prophets,  and  such  as  surely  presumes  a  be- 
lief in  the  remoteness  of  their  date,  the  genuineness 
of  their  character,  and  their  title  to  stand  as  the 


236  THE  MOSAIC  LEGISLA  TION. 

base,  both  doctrinal  and  historic,  of  the  entire 
Hebrew  system  ? 

The  result  of  this  negative  criticism  ought  to  be 
viewed  in  its  extreme  form,  and  this  for  several 
reasons :  such  as,  that,  with  the  lapse  of  time,  it 
continually  adopts  new  negations  ;  that  the  more 
conservative  of  the  latest  schools  exhibit  to  us  no 
principles  which  separate  them  in  the  mass  from 
the  bolder  disintegration ;  and  that  what  is  now 
the  ultima  tluile  of  the  system  may,  a  short  time 
hence,  appear  only  to  have  been  a  stage  on  the  way 
to  positions  as  yet  undreamt  of.  So  viewing  the 
subject,  do  we  not  find  that  it  comes  to  this  :  not 
merely  that  the  Mosaic  laws  received  secondary 
supplements  or  amendments  from  time  to  time,  but 
that  the  entire  fabric  had  grown  up  anonymously 
as  well  as  recently,  and  that  it  rests  upon  no 
guarantee  whatever,  either  of  time,  or  of  place,  or 
of  personal  authority? 

I  have  already  endeavored  to  show  the  historic 
improbability  that  an  upstart  production  could 
have  leaped  into  an  estimation  such  as  belongs  to 


THE  MOSA IC  LEG  IS  LA  TION,  237 

a  firm  tradition  and  a  general  credit  of  antiquity. 
And  now  let  us  look  for  a  moment  at  the  rather 
crude  and  irregular  form  of  the  Mosaic  books  from 
Exodus  to  Deuteronomy.  Taken  as  a  whole,  they 
have  not  that  kind  of  consistency  which  belongs  to 
consecutiveness  of  the  parts,  and  which  almost  uni- 
formly marks  both  historical  and  legal  documents.^ 
They  mix  narrative  and  legislation :  they  pass  from 
one  to  the  other  without  any  obvious  reason.  They 
repeat  themselves  in  a  manner  which  seems  to  ex- 
clude the  idea  that  they  had  undergone  the  careful 
and  reflected  reviews,  the  comparison  of  part  with 
part,  which  is  generally  bestowed  upon  works  of 

1  "  As  to  this  want  of  order  (which  seems  to  me  to  favor  the  idea 
of  contemporaneity),  a  later  codifier  would  have  been  more  artificial 
in  his  arrangement  "  (Milman's  "  History  of  the  Jews,"  3d  edition, 
1863).  Writing  of  the  delivery  of  the  law,  the  learned  and  very 
liberal-minded  Dean  Milman  had  before  him  the  works  of  the  critical 
school  down  to  Bleck ;  and  in  the  admirable  note  (I.  131)  from  which 
I  have  just  quoted  a  few  words,  he  expresses  a  firm  and  reasoned 
dissent  from  the  negative  conclusions  as  to  the  Pentateuch  in  its 
substance,  while  he  strongly  urges  the  likelihood  of  minor  changes 
in  the  text  with  anachronism  and  inaccuracy  here  and  there  as  the 
consequence.  This  note  is  in  effect  a  succinct  but  highly  pregnant 
treatise,  and  will  well  repay  those  who  carefully  peruse  it. 


238  THE  MOSAIC  LEGISLA  TION. 

great  importance,  completed  with  comparative 
leisure,  and  intended  for  the  guidance  not  only  of 
an  individual  but  of  a  people.  They  are  even 
accused  of  contradiction.  They  appear  to  omit 
adjustments,  necessary  in  the  light  of  the  subse- 
quent history :  such,  for  instance,  as  we  might  de- 
sire between  the  sweeping  proscription  not  only 
of  image  worship,  but  of  images  or  shapen  cor- 
poreal forms,  in  the  Second  Commandment,  and 
the  use  actually  made  of  them  in  the  temple,  and 
in  the  singular  case  of  the  serpent  destroyed  by 
Hezekiah  (2  Kings  18:4).  It  seems  not  difficult  to 
account  for  this  roughness  and  crudeness  of  author- 
ship in  the  case  of  Moses,  under  the  circumstances 
of  changeful  nomad  life,  and  the  constant  pressure 
of  anxious  executive  or  judicial  functions,  combined 
with  the  effort  of  constructing  a  weighty  legislative 
code,  which  required  a  totally  different  attitude  of 
mind.  The  life  of  Moses,  as  it  stands  in  the  sa- 
cred text,  must  have  been  habitually  a  life  of  ex- 
traordinary, unintermitted  strain,  and  one  without 
remission  of  that  strain  even    during  its    closing 


THE  MOSAIC  LEGISLA  TION.  239 

period.  As  some  anomalies  in  the  composition  of 
the  Koran  may  be  referable  to  the  circumstances 
of  the  life  of  Mahomet/  so  we  may  apply  a  like 
idea  to  the  configuration  of  the  legislative  books. 
It  is  not  difficult  to  refer  the  anomalies  of  such 
authorship  to  the  incidents  of  such  a  Hfe,  and  to 
conceive  that  any  changes,  which  have  found  their 
way  into  the  text,  may  yet  have  been  such  as  to 
leave  unimpaired  what  may  be  called  the  origi- 
nality, as  well  as  the  integrity,  of  its  character.  But 
how  do  these  considerations  hold,  if  we  are  to  as- 
sume as  our  point  of  departure  the  hypothesis  of 
the  negative  extremists  ?  Under  that  supposition, 
the  legislative  books  were  principally  not  adjusted 
but  composed,  and  this  not  only  in  a  manner  which 

1  See  Rodwell's  Preface  to  the  Koran  respecting  the  Suras.  A 
critic  in  the  Magazine  and  Book  Review  has  cited  against  me  the 
fourteenth  chapter  of  2  Esdras,  and  the  strange  story  it  contains  of 
the  burning  of  the  law  and  the  rewriting  of  it  by  Ezra  This  story 
dates  at  the  earliest  from  the  time  of  Caesar,  according  to  others 
from  Domitian.  Thus  a  tale  which  first  appears  five  centuries  after 
the  alleged  fact  at  once  becomes  au  horitative,  if  it  serves  a  purpose 
of  negation.  But  even  this  story  supports  the  argument  in  the  text, 
for  the  law  is  continuously  and  m  raculously  reproduced  by  dictation 
to  a  body  of  five  scribes. 


240  THE  MOSAIC  LEGISLA  TION. 

totally  falsifies  their  own  solemn  and  often-repeated 
declarations,  but  which  supposes  something  like 
hallucination  on  the  part  of  a  people  that  could 
have  accepted  such  novelties,  and  almost  wor- 
shiped them,  as  ancient.  In  addition  to  all  this, 
they  assumed  their  existing  shape,  so  wanting  as 
to  series  and  method,  in  a  settled  state  of  things, 
in  an  old  historic  land,  with  an  unbounded  freedom 
of  manipulation,  at  any  rate  with  no  restraint  im- 
posed by  respect  for  original  form,  and  with  every 
condition  in  favor  of  the  final  editors,  which  could 
favor  the  production  of  a  thoroughly  systematic 
and  orderly  work.  Does  it  not  seem  that  if  the 
preparation  and  presentation  of  the  Hebrew  code 
took  place  at  the  time  and  in  the  way  imposed  on 
us  by  the  doctrine  of  the  thorough  disintegrationist, 
then  we  stand  entirely  at  a  loss  to  account  for  the 
somewhat  loose  and  irregular  form  of  the  work 
before  us  ?  And  conversely  do  not  the  peculiarities 
of  that  form  constitute  an  objection  to  the  negative 
hypothesis,  which  it  is  an  absolute  necessity  for  its 
promoters  to  get  rid  of  as  best  they  can  ? 


THE  MOSA IC  LEG  IS  LA  TION,  24 1 

Let  me  again  illustrate  the  case  by  referring  to 
the  Iliad.  Those  who  have  referred  that  work  to 
a  variety  of  authors,  have  been  driven  to  very 
subtle  and  questionable  arguments  in  order  to 
exhibit  some  semblance  of  anomaly  in  the  text, 
and  have  always  been  allowed  to  assume  that  the 
final  editors  under  Pericles,  or  at  whatever  epoch, 
wrought  with  energy  and  purpose  to  weld  the 
fragmentary  material  into  a  seemly  w^hole.  Is  it 
conceivable  that  an  operation  such  as  we  are  now 
required  to  believe  in  could  have  been  carried  on 
without  the  sense  of  a  similar  necessity,  or  could 
so  absolutely  have  failed  in  literary  aim  and 
effort  ? 

I  subjoin  one  further  topic  of  the  same  class,  as 

fit  to  be  taken  into  view.     The  absence  from  the 

legislative  books  of  all  assertion  of  a  future  state, 

and  of  all  motive  derived  from  it  with  a  view  to 

conduct,  has  been  already  noticed.     The  probable 

reason  of  that  absence  from  a  code  of  laws  framed 

by  Moses  under  divine  command  or  guidance,  is  a 

subject   alike    of   interest  and    difficulty.      It    has 

16 


242  THE  MOSAIC  LEGISLA  TION, 

sometimes  occurred  to  me  as  possible  that  the 
close  connection  of  the  doctrine  with  public  reli- 
gion in  the  Egyptian  system  might  have  supplied  a 
reason  for  its  disconnection  from  the  Mosaic  laws/ 
even  as  I  suppose  we  might,  from  other  features  of 
those  laws,  draw  proof  or  strong  presumption  that, 
among  the  purposes  of  the  legislator,  there  v/as 
included  a  determination  to  draw  a  broad  and  deep 
line,  or  even  trench  of  demarkation,  between  the 
foreign  religions  in  the  neighborhood  and  the 
religious  system  of  the  Hebrews.  The  connection 
established  by  Moses  between  conduct  and  earthly 
retribution  or  reward,  must  of  itself  have  tended  to 
depress,  if  not  the  Idea  of  a  future  state,  yet  the 
expression  of  that  idea  in  public  documents. 
Especially  we  should  remember  that  the  work  of 
Moses  was  national  rather  than  theological.^  His 
theology  is  a  means  of  conserving  the  national- 
ity, which  was  itself  a  forerunner  and  a  means  of 

iThis    topic   is   touched    by   Bishop   Alexander  in   his   Bampton 
Lectures. 

2  See  Zincke,  "  Egypt  of  the  Pharaohs  and  of  the  Khedive,"  p.  202. 


THE  MOSAIC  LEGISLA  TION.  243 

preparation  for  the  Advent.  It  is  enough  for  my 
present  purpose,  that  the  absence  of  the  doctrine 
of  a  future  state  from  the  work  cannot  be  held  to 
discredit  the  Mosaic  authorship.  But  does  not 
that  absence  help  discredit  the  idea  of  a  post-exilic 
authorship  ?  Is  it  conceivable  that  Hebrews,  pro- 
ceeding to  frame  their  legislative  books,  after  the 
Captivity,  and  long  after  the  Dispersion  of  the  Ten 
Tribes,  and  after  the  light  which  these  events  had 
thrown  upon  the  familiar  ideas  of  a  future  life  and 
an  Underworld,  as  held  both  in  the  East  and  in 
Egypt,  could  have  excluded  all  notice  of  it  from 
their  system  of  laws  ?  We  see  something  of  this 
influence,  in  the  noble  passage  on  the  dead.  Wisdom 
3:1-8,  to  which  there  is  no  parallel  in  any  of  the 
pre-exilic  books.  If  it  was  an  influence  impossible 
to  exclude  at  the  later  date,  then  the  fact  of  the 
exclusion  becomes  another  difficulty  in  the  way  of 
our  accepting  any  such  date  concerning  the  sub- 
stance of  the  legislative  books. 

It  seems,  then,  that  it  is  difficult  to  reconcile  the 
results  of  the  nec:ative  criticism  on  the  Pentateuch 


244  THE  MOSAIC  LEGISLA  TION. 

with  the  known  reverence  of  the  Jews  for  their 
Torah,  which  appears  absolutely  to  presuppose  a 
tradition  of  immemorial  age  on  its  behalf,  as  a 
pre-condition  of  such  universal  and  undoubting 
veneration.  But  if  this  be  necessary  in  the  case  of 
the  Jew,  how  much  more  peremptorily  is  it  required 
by  the  Samaritan  contribution  to  the  present  argu- 
ment, and  what  light  does  that  case  throw  upon 
the  general  question? 

It  seems  certain  that  in  mediaeval  times,  and  until 
the  seventeenth  century,  Christendom  knew  noth- 
ing of  a  Samaritan  testimony  to  the  authenticity  of 
the  Mosaic  books,  excepting  from  certain  slight  ref- 
erences in  the  works  of  the  Fathers  to  "  the  ancient 
Hebrew  according  to  the  Samaritans."  But,  early 
in  the  seventeenth  century,  a  traveler  found,  among 
the  Samaritans  of  Damascus,  a  copy  of  the  Penta- 
teuch in  the  ancient  Hebrew  letters,  and  we  are  told 
that  there  are  now  about  sixteen  of  these  manu- 
scripts in  the  various  European  libraries.  The 
chief  one  in  existence  is  guarded  with  sacred  care 
at  Nablous,  the  ancient  Shechem,  by  a  congrega- 


THE  MOSAIC  LEGISLA  TION.  245 

tion  still  surviving  of  a  few  hundred  Samaritans.^ 
For  questions  of  textual  accuracy  this  work  is 
esteemed  inferior  to  the  Hebrew,  though  it  is  not 
wholly  without  a  claim  to  more  archaic  forms. 

The  Samaritan  Pentateuch  is  one  of  the  most  re- 
markable monuments  of  antiquity.  Its  testimony, 
of  course,  cannot  be  adduced  to  show  that  the 
books  following  the  Pentateuch  have  been  clothed 
from  a  very  ancient  date  with  the  reverence  due  to 
the  Divine  Word;  indeed,  it  is  even  capable  of 
being  employed,  in  a  limited  measure,  the  other 
way.  But  as  respects  the  Samaritan  Pentateuch 
itself,  how  is  it  possible  to  conceive  that  it  should 
have  held  as  a  Divine  work  the  supreme  place  in 
the  regard  of  the  Samaritans,  if,  about  or  near 
the  year  500  B.  C.,^  or,  still  more,  if  at  the  time 
of  Manasseh  the  seceder,^  it  had,  as  matter  of  fact, 
been  a  recent  compilation  of  their  enemies  the 
Jews  ?  or  if  it  had  been  regarded  as  anything  less 

1  See  Paterson  Smyth,  p.  118.  '  Paterson  Smyth,  p.  49. 

3  Placed   by   Wellhausea  at    about    375  B.   C,     "Hist.   Israel" 
(Black),  p.  498. 


246  THE  MOSAIC  LEGISLA  TION. 

than  a  record  of  a  great  revelation  from  God,  his- 
torically known,  or  at  the  least  universally  believed, 
to  have  come  down  to  them  in  the  shape  it  then 
held  from  antiquity  ?  Be  it  remembered  that  this 
work  itself,  and  an  approximate  date  for  its  known 
existence,  are  not  matters  of  mere  speculation,  but 
are  accepted  results  of  historical  research.  And  it 
is  in  this  as  in  other  cases  a  matter  for  serious  con- 
sideration, whether  w^e  can  accept  the  ingenious 
conclusions  of  critics  before  we  know  whether  they 
are  to  be  shattered  and  shivered  when  flung;  against 
the  face  of  the  strong  rock  of  history. 

The  Samaritan  Pentateuch,  then,  forms  in  itself 
a  remarkable  indication,  nay,  even  a  proof,  that,  at 
the  date  from  which  we  know  it  to  have  been 
received,  the  Pentateuch  was  no  novelty  among 
the  Jews.  But  may  we  not  state  the  argument  in 
broader  terms?  Surely  the  reverence  of  the  Sa- 
maritans for  the  Torah  could  not  have  begun  at 
this  period,  hardly  could  have  had  its  first  begin- 
ning at  any  period  posterior  to  the  schism.  If 
these  books  grew  by  gradual  accretion,  still  that 


THE  MOSAIC  LEG  I  SLA  TION.  247 

must  have  been  an  accretion  gathering  round  the 
work  within  a  single  channel.  A  double  process 
could  not  have  been  carried  on  in  harmony.  Nor 
can  we  easily  suppose  that,  when  the  Ten  tribes 
separated  from  the  Two,  they  did  not  carry  with 
them  the  law,  on  which  their  competing  worship 
was  to  be  founded.  In  effect,  is  there  any  rational 
supposition  except  that  the  kingdom  of  Israel  had 
possessed  at  the  time  of  Rehoboam  some  code 
corresponding  in  substance,  in  all  except  pure  de- 
tail, with  that  which  was  subsequently  written  out 
in  the  famous  manuscripts  we  now  possess? 

I  have  not  attempted  in  these  essays  to  discuss 
the  general  credit  of  the  historic  books ;  yet,  in 
connection  with  the  Samaritans,  I  must  here  touch 
briefly  on  a  single  point.  The  negative  critics  are 
fairly  challenged  to  explain  to  us  how  it  is  that 
priestly  fabricators,  writing  at  a  late  date  in  the 
interest  of  their  order,  have  so  notably  abstained 
from  endeavors  to  glorify  its  virtues  and  honors,  or 
to  conceal  its  lapses  from  right.  In  a  yet  wider 
view,  we  may  ask  how  it  has  come  about  that  they 


248  THE  MOSAIC  LEGISLA  TION, 

have  entirely  avoided  attempts  to  magnify  the  re- 
ligious responsibilities  of  the  schism  w^hich  divided 
Israel.  It  seems  indeed  strange  that  if  these  books 
were  in  substance  framed  after  the  Exile,  and  in 
times  when  a  spirit  of  rigorous  uniformity  prevailed, 
a  more  emphatic  and  distinct  censure  should  not 
have  passed  upon  Jeroboam,  on  the  simple  ground  of 
his  having  established  a  separate  and  rival  worship. 
The  man  of  God,  who  came  from  Judah,  did 
indeed  testify  against  the  altar  in  Bethel ;  but  that 
altar  was  associated  with  the  golden  calf  established 
and  worshiped  there  (as  well  as  in  Dan)  by  Jero- 
boam ;  and  the  testimony  of  the  prophet,  or  man 
of  God,  against  this  altar,  embraced  "  all  the  houses 
of  the  high  places  which  are  in  the  cities  of  Sama- 
ria," and  was  therefore  a  testimony  against  idolatry, 
not  against  mere  schism  (i  Kings  12  :  28,  29,  32; 
13  :  32).  The  special  sin  of  Jeroboam,  which 
caused  his  house  to  be  cut  off,  was  not  that  he 
divided  Israel,  but  that  he  degraded  its  religion 
by  making  priests  of  the  lowest  of  the  people 
(i  Kings  13  :  33).     Nay,  the  books  present  to  us 


THE  MOSA IC  LEGISLA  TION.  249 

the  two  illustrious  prophets,  Elijah  and  Elisha,  as 
having  Israel  for  their  field,  and  as  working  there, 
not  on  behalf  of  the  Levitical  priesthood,  but  on 
behalf  of  righteousness  as  against  sin,  and  of  God 
as  against  Baal ;  in  complete  conformity  with  the 
spirit  of  the  prophetic  Books,  which  so  largely  con- 
cern the  ten  tribes.  How  is  it  conceivable  that  men 
wicked  enough  to  forge  should  so  carefully  have 
eschewed  gathering  any  fruits  from  their  forgery? 

Let  us  close  this  portion  of  the  subject  with  a 
plea  of  a  different  order,  one  which,  adm.itting 
probable  imperfection  in  the  text,  deprecates,  as 
opposed  to  the  principles  of  sound  criticism,  any 
conclusion  therefrom  adverse  to  its  general  fidelity. 
It  has  caused  me  some  surprise  to  notice  (i)  that 
some  negative  writers  lay  considerable  stress 
upon  what  they  deem  to  be  numerical  errors  in 
the  books  of  the  Old  Testament ;  and  (2)  that,  so 
far  as  I  have  seen,  they  do  not  advert  to  the 
increased  risks  of  mistake  in  the  transmission  of 
numbers  as  compared  with  other  literaiy  matter, 
whether  if  be  by  copying,  or  by  word  of  mouth. 


250  THE  MOSAIC  LEGISLA  TION, 

The  increased  risk,  which  accompanies  all  re- 
cording of  numbers,  extends  likewise  to  enumera- 
tions, such  as  genealogical  or  other  recitals  of 
names  in  lists  ;  subject,  however,  to  the  remark  that, 
where  meter  is  used,  inasmuch  as  it  supplies  a 
framework  for  particular  words  which  would  not 
apply  to  other  words,  the  danger  is  proportionably 
less ;  and  also  that,  where  the  record  is  by  writing, 
and  not  by  simple  hearing,  the  eye  has  the  oppor- 
tunity of  traversing  again  and  again  the  names,  as 
the  mechanical  process  is  carried  on  ;  and  these 
names  will  in  many  cases  stand  in  connection  with, 
and  so  be  seen  to  check,  one  anotlier. 

Bishop  Colenso,  for  example,  lays  very  great 
stress  on  the  numbers  assigned  by  the  Old  Testa- 
ment to  the  children  of  Israel  on  their  passage 
through  the  desert,  and  observing  on  the  practical 
difficulties  v/hich  such  a  multitude  must  encounter 
on  a  march,  treats  the  case  as  one  which  materially 
impugns  the  general  credit  of  the  history,^ 

^  See  Colenso  on  the  Pentateuch  and  Joshua,  Part  I.,  Chap.  XII., 
et  alibi. 


THE  MOSA IC  LEG  IS  LA  TION.  2  5  I 

I  suppose  that  those  who  are  practically  con- 
versant with  the  movement  of  men  in  large 
bodies  may  be  inclined  to  follow  Colenso  in  ques- 
tioning the  statements  of  numbers,  both  at  that 
point  of  their  history,  and  in  many  other  places 
of  the  narrative.  It  is  quite  another  question 
whether,  because  errors  may  have  crept  into  the 
numbers,  the  recitals  of  facts  generally  are  there- 
fore  untrustworthy. 

There  is  a  broad  and  clear  difference,  of  which 
note  ought  to  be  taken.  Both  in  copying  and  in 
original  composition,  as  a  general  rule,  the  structure 
of  the  sentence,  or  what  is  called  the  context,  is 
mentally  carried  onwards,  and  the  general  drift 
confines  within  narrow  limits  the  possibility  of 
error  in  the  particular  words.  Mistake  in  the  form 
would  very  commonly  betray  itself  by  inconsistency 
in  the  sense  ;  and  this  inconsistency  would  not  fail 
to  be  detected,  because  the  relation  between  the 
parts  of  the  sentence  is  ordinarily  perceived  as  the 
process  is  carried  on.  But  the  relation  betvveen 
numerical  amounts  is   not  at  once  determined  for 


252  THE  MOSA IC  LEG  I  SLA  TION, 

the  copyist  by  the  context,  and  usually  requires  a 
distinct  and  careful  examination  to  detect  it. 

I  will  give  two  practical  illustrations  of  this  state- 
ment, the  one  very  old  and  the  other  very  modern ; 
the  one  touching  oral  and  the  other  written  trans- 
mission. 

'  The  most  elaborate  invocation  of  the  Muse,  or 
appeal  for  divine  assistance,  in  the  whole  of  the 
Poems  of  Homer,  is  the  Preface^  to  the  Catalogue 
of  the  Greek  troops  and  ships ;  and  this,  although 
in  no  part  of  the  poems  could  less  of  effort  properly 
poetic  be  required.  But  the  Catalogue  consists 
partly  of  numerical  statements  of  the  strength  of 
the  contingents  which  made  up  the  fleet,  partly  of 
geographical  detail  of  the  names  of  towns  and  dis- 
tricts ;  and  here  we  find  the  rationale  of  the  poet's 
call  for  special  aid  from  heaven,  and  for  his  care 
with  a  view  to  accuracy,  and  this  although  he  had 
meter  to  assist  him. 

I  now  turn  to  very  modern  practice.  In  the  year 
1853,  it  was  my  duty  for  the  first  time  to  submit 

1  Iliad,  II.,  484-493. 


THE  MOSA IC  LEGISLA  TION.  2  5  3 

to  Parliament  one  of  the  large  and  complex  state- 
ments of  the  public  accounts  for  the  year,  which 
are  associated  in  England  with  the  familiar  name 
of  the  Budget.  The  speeches,  in  which  these 
statements  were  contained,  were  made  known  to 
the  country  by  reporting  in  the  usual  manner. 
But  the  art  of  the  reporters  could  not  be  trusted  to 
convey  the  figures  with  accuracy  by  the  ear.  A 
practice  had  consequently  grown  up  of  supplying 
them  from  the  proper  official  source  in  carefully 
written  statements  for  their  guidance,  which  were 
sent  to  them  during  the  delivery  of  the  speech.  It 
has  now  been  found  more  convenient  not  to  trust 
at  all  to  the  ear,  and  the  Minister  is  understood  to 
speak  from  printed  figures  :  but  this  in  no  way 
weakens  the  illustration  I  have  used. 

My  position  amounts  to  but  does  not  go  beyond 
this,  that  the  same  care  which  ensures  general 
fidelity  of  statement  in  ordinary  recitals  of  fact, 
does  not  suffice  to  secure  numerical  precision; 
and  conversely,  that  the  want  of  such  precision, 
which    may  sometimes  be    suspected    in   the   Old 


254  THE  MOSAIC  LEGISLA  TION, 

Testament,  does  not  raise  presumptions  adverse  to 
general  correctness. 

The  necessary  limits  of  this  essay  do  not  permit 
of  my  entering  on  the  contents  of  the  Mosaic  legis- 
lation. It  is,  I  apprehend,  both  far  more  complex 
and  far  deeper  than  the  other  systems  of  ancient 
law  known  to  us,  as  well  as  far  higher  in  its  moral 
aims.  I  humbly  recommend  that  those  who  read 
it  should  fix  their  minds  upon  the  skill  with  which 
it  is  addressed  to  the  attainment  of  ends  of  such  a 
nature  as  to  render  them,  in  their  ordinary  aspects, 
hardly  reconcilable  with  one  another.  Severely 
proscriptive  of  the  stranger, — namely,  the  nations 
whom  it  found  in  possession  of  Canaan, — it  is  as 
singularly  liberal  and  generous  towards  him  when 
he  has  made  his  peace  with  Hebrewism.  Again, 
the  Pentateuchal  code  differs  from  (I  believe)  all 
others  in  the  extraordinary  amount  of  its  sanitary 
legislation,  and  in  investing  it  with  a  quasi-moral 
character.  But  a  sense  of  some  strangeness  in  this 
respect  alters  into  a  profound  admiration  of  the 
sagacity  which  includes    in    its    far-reaching   view 


THE  MOSAIC  LEGISLA  TION.  2 5  5 

provisions  for  giving  an  exceptionally  high  charac- 
ter even  to  the  physical  constitution  of  a  people 
that  was  meant  to  remain  socially  separate  from 
the  nations  of  the  world.  Again  :  while  aiming 
much  at  equality,  simplicity,  and  industry,  as 
fountains  of  order  and  of  strength,  it  embodies 
most  peculiar  regulations  for  the  purpose  of  re- 
straining within  the  narrowest  limits  both  that 
growth  of  wealth,  which  is  their  natural  result, 
and  also  the  spirit  of  enterprise,  which  would  have 
burst  prematurely  the  narrow  bounds  of  Palestine, 
and  destroyed  the  seclusion  of  the  chosen  people 
by  untimely  contact  with  the  nations  of  the  world. 
The  design  seemingly  was  to  repress  the  latent 
powers  of  human  nature,  and  to  secure  a  con- 
ser\'ative,  even  a  stationary  community,  changeless 
as  the  truths  of  which  it  was  the  guardian.  The 
completeness  of  the  severance  was  not  impaired  by 
the  Captivity  and  Dispersion  of  Israel,  or  by  the 
Exile  of  the  Jews  in  Babylon,  or  by  the  creation  of 
Jewish  factories  abroad,  or  by  the  final  destruction 
of  the  political  independence  of  the  country,  or  by 


256  THE  MOSAIC  LEGISLA  TION. 

the  invasion  and  supremacy  of  the  Greek  language. 
The  Jew,  when  our  Lord  came,  was  still,  and  was 
even  more  than  ever,  the  Jew  ;  and  so,  though  it 
may  have  been  despite  of  himself,  the  purpose  of 
his  great  stewardship  was  accomplished. 


VI. 

ON  THE  RECENT  CORROBORATIONS  OF 

SCRIPTURE  FROM  THE  REGIONS  OF 

HISTORY  AND  NATURAL  SCIENCE. 

I.  preliminary;   ii.  as  to  the  creation   story; 

III.    AS   to    the   flood    story;     IV.   AS   TO   THE 

great    dispersion;    v.  as  to   the  sinaitic 
journey. 

It  is  to  be  observed  that  many  of  the  favorite 

subjects  of  scientific  or  systematic  thought  in  the 

present  day  are  of  a  nature  powerfully  tending  to 

reinforce  or  illustrate  the  arguments  available  for 

the   proof  of  religion,   and   for   the  authority  of 

Scripture.     If  it  had  been  actually  proved,  as  it  is 

largely  argued  and  seriously  held,  that  the  vast  and 

diversified  scheme  of  organic  life  throughout  the 

world  has  been  evolved  from  a  few  simple  types,  or 

possibly  from  one,  such   a  demonstration  would 

17  257 


258  RECENT  CORROBORATIONS 

both  enlarge  and  confirm  the  great  argument  of 
design.  For  this  argument,  instead  of  being  drawn 
from  particular  and  separate  constructions,  would 
then  be  drawn  from  the  entire  scheme  of  creation, 
and  from  the  relation  of  all  its  parts  to  one  another, 
inasmuch  as  every  earlier  portion  of  it  would  be 
an  indication,  and  therefore  a  prediction,  of  all  those 
which  were  to  succeed;  the  seed  of  a  long  series 
of  harvests  to  come.  "Day  unto  day  uttereth 
speech,  and  night  unto  night  showeth  knowledge  " 
(Psa.  19  :  2). 

Again,  the  formal  treatment  in  recent  years  of 
the  subject  of  heredity  not  only  tends  to  link  the 
generations  of  mankind  in  one,  but,  in  proving 
that  our  nature  undergoes  incessant  modification 
through  the  influence  of  progenitors,  enlarges  our 
conception  of  the  width  of  its  range,  and  the 
varieties  of  those  forms  which  it  is  capable  of  as- 
suming. It  shov/s  us,  for  example,  how  the  nature, 
as  well  as  the  environment,  of  descendants,  is  de- 
teriorated by  the  fault  of  ancestors,  and  how  there 
may  have  been  an  education  of  the  race  from  child- 


OF  SCRIPTURE.  259 

hood  to  maturity,  or  some  converse  process  of 
decay.  Thus  the  doctrine  of  birth-sin,  as  it  is 
sometimes  called,  is  simply  the  recognition  of 
the  hereditary  disorder  and  degeneracy  of  our 
natures ;  and,  of  all  men,  the  evolutionist  would 
find  it  most  difficult  to  establish  a  title  to  object 
to  it  in  principle. 

On  these  grounds,  and  on  others  more  specific 
which  it  will  be  the  aim  of  this  essay  to  set  forth 
in  given  instances,  we  should  dispel  wholly  from 
our  minds  those  spectral  notions  of  antagonism 
between  religion  and  science  which  have  been 
raised  up  by  the  action  of  prejudice  on  the  one 
side,  and  perhaps  by  the  occasional  practice  of 
bragging  on  the  other.  Of  religion  and  of  science, 
as  of  man  and  wife,  let  us  boldly  say,  "  What  God 
hath  joined,  let  not  man  put  asunder."  But  I  pro- 
ceed to  particular  illustrations. 

II. AS   TO   THE    CREATION   STORY. 

A  double  confirmation  has,  I  conceive,  in  our 
time,  been  supplied  to  the  Creation  Story  of  Gen- 


260  RECENT  CORROBORA  TIONS 

esis ;  the  first  by  natural,  and  the  second  by  historic, 
science. 

Perhaps  we  have  been  too  readily  satisfied  with 
assuming,  in  regard  to  this  narrative,  a  defensive 
position;  whereas  it  may  be  found  to  contain  within 
its  own  brief  compass,  when  rightly  considered,  the 
guarantee  of  a  Divine  communication  to  man  strictly 
corresponding  with  what  in  familiar  speech  is  termed 
Revelation. 

We  have  here  in  outline  a  primordial  history  of 
the  planet  which  we  inhabit,  and  of  the  celestial 
system  to  which  it  belongs ;  of  the  planet,  and  of 
the  first  appearance  and  early  developments  of  life 
upon  it,  anterior  to  the  creation  of  man,  in  many 
of  the  principal  stages  which  have  been  ascertained 
by  geology;  of  the  celestial  organization  to  which 
our  earth  belongs,  whether  in  all  its  vastness  or 
only  within  the  limits  of  the  solar  system,  we  may 
be  unable  to  say,  but,  at  the  least,  a  sketch  of  the 
formation  of  that  system  from  a  prior  and  unad- 
justed or  chaotic  state.  Upon  such  a  document  a 
sharp  issue  is  at  once  raised,  at  least  as  to  the  latter 


OF  SCRIPTURE.  261 

or  strictly  terrestrial  part  of  it,  the  earth-history,  for 
all  those  who  hold  it  to  be  in  its  substance  a  true 
account.  We  accept  from  Science,  as  demonstrated, 
a  series  of  geological  conclusions.  We  have  found 
the  geology  of  Genesis  to  stand  in  such  a  relation 
to  these  conclusions  as  could  not  have  been  ex- 
hibited in  a  record  framed  by  faculties  merely 
human,  at  any  date  to  which  the  origin  of  the 
Creation  Story  can  now  reasonably  be  referred. 
Starting  from  this  premise,  we  have  no  means  of 
avoiding  or  holding  back  from  the  conclusion 
that  the  materials  of  the  story  could  not  have 
been  had  without  preterhuman  aid  ;  and  such 
preterhuman  aid  is  what  we  term  Divine  Revela- 
tion. And  if  the  time  shall  ever  come  when  as- 
tronomers shall  be  in  a  condition  to  apply  to  the 
earlier  portion  of  the  chapter  the  demonstrative 
methods,  which  geology  has  found  for  the  lat- 
ter part,  it  may  happen  that  we  shall  owe  a  debt 
of  the  same  kind,  and  of  as  great  amount,  to 
astronomy,  as  we  now  owe  to  geologic  science. 
My  present  purpose  is  to  call  particular  attention 


262  RECENT  CORROBORA  TIONS 

to  the  exact  nature  and  extraordinary  amount  of 
that  debt. 

There  was  nothing  necessarily  unreasonable  in 
accepting  as  worthy  of  belief  this  portion  of  the 
Book  of  Genesis,  along  with  the  rest  of  the  Book, 
and  with  other  books  of  Holy  Scripture,  on  general 
proofs  of  their  inspiration,  if  sufficient,  apart  from 
any  independent  buttress  furnished  either  by  science 
or  by  history  for  the  Creation  Story.  In  a  court  of 
justice,  the  evidence  of  a  witness  is  to  be  accepted 
on  matters  within  his  cognizance,  when  it  is  con- 
sistent  with  itself,  and  when  neither  his  character 
nor  his  intelligence  is  questioned ;  or  again,  when 
the  main  part  of  a  continuous  narrative  is  suffi- 
ciently verified,  it  may  be  right  to  accept  the  rest 
without  separate  verification.  If,  however,  a  new 
witness  comes  into  court,  and  pretends  to  give  us 
fresh  and  scientific  proof  of  the  Creation  Story  this 
may  be  true  or  may  be  false.  If  false,  the  story 
is  not  disproved ;  it  stands  where  it  stood  before. 
Bad  arguments  are  often  made  for  a  good  cause. 
But,  if  true,  the  event  is  one  of  vast  importance. 


OF  SCRIPTURE.  263 

Nov/  the  present  position  is  as  follows.  Apart 
altogether  from  faith,  and  from  the  general  evidences 
of  Revelation,  a  new  witness  has  come  into  the 
court,  in  the  shape  of  Natural  Science.  She  builds 
up  her  system  on  the  observation  of  facts,  and  upon 
inferences  from  them,  which  at  length  attain  to  a 
completeness  and  security  such  as,  if  not  presenting 
us  with  a  demonstration  in  the  strictest  sense,  yet 
constrain  us,  as  intelligent  beings,  to  belief. 

The  Creation  Story  divides  itself  into  the  cos- 
mological  portion,  occupying  the  first  nineteen 
verses  of  the  chapter,  and  the  geological  portion, 
which  is  given  in  the  last  twelve.  The  former 
part  has  less,  and  the  latter  part  has  more,  to  do 
with  the  direct  evidence  of  fact,  and  the  stringency 
of  the  authority  which  the  two  may  severally  claim 
varies  accordingly  ;  but  in  both  the  narrative  seems 
to  demand,  upon  the  evidence  as  it  stands,  rational 
assent.  In  regard  to  both,  it  is  held  on  the  affirma- 
tive side  that  the  statements  of  Genesis  have  a  cer- 
tain relation  both  to  the  ascertained  facts  and  to 
the  best  accepted  reasonings ;  and  that  this  relation 


264  RECENT  CORK  OB  OR  A  TIONS 

is  of  such  a  nature  as  to  require  us,  in  the  char- 
acter of  rational  investigators,  to  acknowledge  in 
the  written  record  the  presence  of  elements  which 
must  be  referred  to  a  superhuman  origin.  If  this 
be  so,  then  be  it  observed  that  natural  science  is 
now  rendering  a  new  and  enormous  service  to  the 
great  cause  of  belief  in  the  unseen ;  and  is  under- 
pinning, so  to  speak,  the  structure  of  that  divine 
revelation,  which  was  contained  in  the  Book  of 
Genesis,  by  a  new  and  solid  pillar,  built  up,  on  a 
foundation  of  its  own,  from  beneath. 

It  is,  then,  to  be  borne  in  mind,  that,  as  against 
those  who  by  arbitrary  or  irrational  interpretation, 
place  Genesis  and  science  at  essential  variance,  our 
position  is  not  one  merely  defensive.  We  are  not 
mere  reconcilers,  as  some  call  us,  searching  out 
expedients  to  escape  a  difficulty,  to  repel  an  assault. 
We  seek  to  show,  and  we  may  claim  to  have  shown, 
that  the  account  recorded  in  the  Creation  Story  for 
the  instruction  of  all  ages  has  been  framed  on  the 
principles  which,  for  such  an  account,  reason  recom- 
mends ;  and  that,  interpreted  in  this  view,  its  entry 


OF  SCRIPTURE,  265 

into  the  argument  is  at  this  juncture  Hke  the 
arrival  of  a  new  auxiliary  army  in  the  field  while 
the  battle  is  in  progress ;  like  the  arrival,  to 
choose  a  historical  instance,  of  the  Prussians  at 
Waterloo. 

Such  is  the  confirmatory  argument  founded  upon 
the  contents.  But  now,  yet  another  ally  has  come 
to  join  our  ranks,  under  the  title  of  Archaeologic 
and  Historic  Science.  It  has  deciphered  the  cunei- 
form inscriptions,  and  has  read  among  them  a 
Creation  Story  inscribed  on  the  tablets  found  at 
Nineveh.  Here  we  have  a  new  witness  to  the  very 
early  existence,  among  civilized  or  partly  civilized 
men,  of  records  of  creation  corresponding  in  very 
essential  particulars  with  the  Hebrew  narrative. 
Such  a  witness  plainly  to  some  extent  offers  to  it 
confirmation,  but  also  stands  in  competition  with 
it.  The  competition  is  in  those  particulars  where 
the  accounts  are  not  in  harmony.  As  to  these, 
standing  on  the  character  of  its  contents,  the 
Hebrew  tradition  lays  claim  to  superior  antiquity 
and  authority.     But  in  proving  the  vast  antiquity 


266  RECENT  CORK  OB  OR  A  TIONS 

of  certain  fundamental  ideas,  the  two  are  concur- 
rent, and  not  competitive. 

The  Babylonian  Creation  Story  is  given  by  Mr. 
Smith  in  his  "  Assyrian  Discoveries,"  ^  so  far  as  its 
mutilated  state  permits.  It  runs  as  follows,  and  we 
cannot,  I  think,  but  cherish  the  hope  that  it  may 
hereafter  receive  extension  or  elucidation.  "  When 
the  gods  in  their  assembly  made  the  universe,  there 
was  confusion,  and  the  gods  sent  out  the  spirit  of 
life.  They  then  create  the  beast  of  the  field,  the 
animal  of  the  field,  and  the  reptile  or  the  creeping 
thing  of  the  field,  and  fix  in  them  the  spirit  of  life. 
Next  comes  the  creation  of  domestic  animals,  and 
the  creeping  things  of  the  city."  Here  we  have,  i, 
creation  by  the  gods ;  2,  chaos ;  3,  life,  and  only  by 
inference,  order ;  4,  wide  extension  of  this  life  in 
beasts  and  reptiles ;  5,  after  this  the  domesticated 
animals.  Thus  there  is  before  us  a  real,  though 
rude  and  imperfect,  structural  resemblance  to  the 
Hebrew  narrative,  together  with  the  lowering  in- 
terpolation of  polytheism. 

*  Page  397. 


OF  SCRIPTURE.  267 

From  the  works  of  Schrader^  on  the  cuneiform 
inscriptions,  some  further  particulars  may  be 
gathered.  He  observes  that  in  Berosus,  as  in 
Genesis,  we  begin  with  water  and  darkness.  On 
which  I  would  only  observe  that  Berosus,  who 
wrote  in  Greek,  may  not  improbably  have  known 
the  Mosaic  writings,^  and,  as  I  have  already  stated, 
that  water,  in  the  text  of  Genesis,  may  be  equiva- 
lent to  fluid.  The  marked  points  of  correspondence 
appear  to  be  these :  that  the  heavenly  bodies  are 
created  after  the  heavens,  which  last  expression,  I 
presume,  may  be  meant  to  include  the  light.  That 
the  land  population  follows  that  of  the  water,  and 
appears  when  vegetation  has  already  begun.  That 
the  monuments  name  a  Babylonian  week,  with  the 
seventh  day  as  a  day  of  consecration,  called  also 
an  evil  day,^  perhaps  because  evil  for  any  work  done 
on  it.     The  inscription  says  : — 

"  To  redeem  them,  created  mankind 
The  merciful  one,  in  whom  is  the  power 
that  summons  to  life," 

^Schrader,  "  The  Cuneiform  Inscriptions  and  the  Old  Testament." 
Translated  by  Whitehouse.     Vol.  I.,  pp.  4,  seqq. 

2  Smith,  Biogr.  Diet.  »  Schrader,  p.  19. 


268  RECENT  CORK  OB  OR  A  TIONS 

which  is  faintly  comparable  with  the  words  of  Gene- 
sis 2  :  7,  and  the  Jehovistic  account,  "and  breathed 
into  his  nostrils  the  breath  of  life."  What  seems 
to  disappear  from  the  Babylonian  account  is  that 
evident  intention  of  series  and  orderly  develop- 
ment, or  evolution,  which  is  so  wonderful  a  feature 
in  the  Mosaic  narrative. 

Dawson,  in  a  recent  work,  observes  that  the 
polytheistic  element  is  the  distinctive  feature  of  the 
Chaldean  record,  and  that  the  originals  of  the  tab- 
lets from  Nineveh  may  have  been  very  ancient,  but 
that  they  are  so  mixed  up  with  the  history  of  the 
Chaldean  hero,  named  Izdubar,  as  to  suggest  that 
there  may  have  existed  before  it  still  older  creation 
legends.  He  compares  this  record  with  the  corres- 
ponding account  in  Genesis,  which  is  as  broadly 
marked  with  the  idea  of  the  Divine  unity  as  the 
Chaldean  legend  is  pervaded  by  the  conception  of 
polytheism.  And  he  adds  :  "  Is  it  not  likely  that 
the  simpler  belief  is  older  than  the  more  complex ; 
that  which  required  no  priests,  ritual,  or  temple, 
older  than  that  with  which  all  these  things  were 


OF  SCRIPTURE.  269 

necessarily  associated?"  He  naturally  assigns  a 
marked  superiority  to  the  "  Hebrew  Genesis."^  In 
truth,  that  superiority  seems  to  be  not  great  only, 
but  immeasurable.  In  one  point  only  do  the  tab- 
lets go  beyond  the  narrative  of  Genesis  ;  they 
record  the  great  struggle  of  Deity  with  rebellion, 
the  war  in  heaven  between  Merodach  and  Tiamat. 
But,  upon  the  whole,  our  Bible  narrative  is  a  regu- 
lar structure;  it  is  orderly,  progressive,  and  rational ; 
that  of  the  tablets  is  dark  and  confused.  This 
may,  however,  be  referable  in  part  to  the  imper- 
fection of  the  tablets,  the  third  of  which,  Mr. 
Sayce  thinks,  may  probably  have  recounted  the 
formation  of  the  earth.*  The  one  is  charged  in  a 
marvelous  way  with  instruction  and  moral  purpose ; 
from  the  other  they  have  almost  disappeared.  The 
first  has,  as  we  believe,  been  receiving  marked  con- 
firmation in  the  most  vital  particulars  from  cosmic 
and  geologic  science ;  on  the  second  they  can 
hardly  be  said  to  cast  more  than  the  faintest  light. 

1 '  Modem  Science  in  Bible  Lands,"  p.  32. 
*  "  Hibbert  Lecture*,"  p.  3^. 


270  RECENT  CORROBORATIONS 

And  yet  this  inferior  document  is  itself  of  very- 
great  confirmatory  value ;  for  the  Izdubar  legends, 
says  Mr.  Smith/  appear  to  have  been  composed 
more  than  2000  years  B.  C.  There  is  no  late  date 
to  which  the  Mosaic  narrative  can  with  a  shadow 
of  probability  be  referred.  It  could  not  have  been 
formed  without  a  miracle  from  the  tablets  as  they 
stand.  The  two  are  evidently  accounts  proceeding 
from  a  common  source,  but  derived  through  chan- 
nels partly  or  wholly  independent.  The  one  comes 
through  a  powerful  and  civilized  empire,  the  other 
through  an  obscure  nomad  family.  In  the  relative 
superiority  of  the  Mosaic  narrative,  all  the  rules  of 
merely  human  likelihoods  are  reversed ;  and  the 
presumption  of  a  Divine  illumination  is  proportion- 
ably  augmented.  But  the  unsuspected  antiquity 
of  the  inferior  legend  attests  by  an  independent 
witness,  if  not  the  truth,  yet  at  least  the  presumable 
origin,  of  its  transcendent  rival. 

So  far  as  scientific  opinion  is  concerned,  another 
remarkable  confirmation  seems  to  have  been  given 

1 "  Assyrian  Discoveries,"  p.  i66. 


OF  SCRIPTURE.  IJl 

to  the  cosmical  portion  of  the  Creation  Story  in 
Genesis  by  the  course  which  it  has  taken  of  late 
years.  Writing  in  1839,  Dr.  Whewell  devoted  a 
chapter  of  his  ''  Bridgewater  Treatises  on  Astron- 
omy and  Physics"^  to  the  Nebular  or,  as  it  is 
often  called,  Rotatory  hypothesis.  He  described 
it  in  outline,  as  it  had  been  conceived  by  Laplace. 
The  idea  of  it  was  that  the  mass,  which  eventually 
centered  in  the  sun,  had  revolved  in  a  state  of  exces- 
sive heat ;  that,  as  "it  gradually  cooled,  the  rapidity 
of  its  motion  was  increased;  that,  as  the  centrifugal 
force  thus  grew,  the  mass  detached  from  itself  ex- 
terior zones  or  rings  of  gas  or  vapor,  which  most 
commonly  broke  up  into  several  minor  masses, 
and  so  gradually  formed  the  planetary  system. 
Dr.  Whewell's  object  in  this  early  notice  of  a 
subject,  which  has  since  attracted,  I.  believe,  very 
general  attention  in  the  world  of  astronomical 
science,  was  to  sustain  and  illustrate  his  general 
argument,  by  showing  how  this  theory  did  noth- 
ing whatever  to  explain  the  origin  of  the  system, 

1  Chapter  VII.,  p.  181. 


lyi  RECENT  CORROBORATIONS 

or  to  weaken  the  statement  of  Newton,  that  its 
admirable  arrangement  must  be  "  the  work  of  an 
intelligent  and  most  powerful  being."  The  origin 
of  this  rotation,  said  Dr.  Whewell,  remains  unex- 
plained, and  still  as  powerfully  as  ever  cries  aloud 
for  and  proclaims  an  Author.  My  purpose  in 
here  naming  the  subject  is  to  point  out  that  Dr. 
Whewell  then  found  himself  dealing  with  a  theory 
which  had  not  yet  obtained  any  wide  currency  or 
authority,  and  he  then  "  left  to  other  persons  and 
to  future  ages  to  decide  upon  the  merits  of  the 
nebular  hypothesis."^  But,  during  the  half-century 
which  has  elapsed  since  he  produced  his  Treatise, 
the  hypothesis  is  understood  to  have  gained  very 
general,  if  not  indeed  unanimous,  acceptance  from 
astronomers.  I  refer  to  this  result  of  the  most 
modern  studies  as  a  new  and  remarkable  establish- 
ment of  accord  between  natural  science  on  the  one 
hand  (so  far  as  its  reasonings  have  proceeded),  and 
the  Book  of  Genesis  on  the  other.  Often  has  it 
been  endeavored  to  place  the  Mosaic  geology  in 

1  Page  190. 


OF  SCRIPTURE.  273 

conflict  with  ascertained  results  ;  but  less,  though 
even  here  something,  of  the  same  kind  has  been 
attempted,  so  far  as  I  know,  by  persons  of  scientific 
authority,  with  regard  to  the  cosmogony  which 
occupies  the  earlier  portion  of  the  chapter.  On 
the  other  hand,  it  has  been  shown,  with  what  seems 
to  me  conclusive  clearness,  that,  without  the  use  of 
scientific  language,  that  very  process  has  been  de- 
scribed in  slight  outline,  but  in  singular  correspon- 
dence with  the  hypothesis  now  so  largely  accepted. 
That  hypothesis  may  not  indeed  have  reached  the 
point  of  demonstration,  and  this  the  subject-matter 
itself  may  be  found  not  to  permit ;  yet  it  has  at- 
tained to  so  much  of  authorit}^  from  consent  that 
Dr.  Whewell,  were  he  writing  now,  would  not 
have  had  simply  to  hand  it  over  to  the  future  for 
consideration,  but  would  more  probably  have  de- 
clared that  it  holds  the  field,  and  seems  little  likely 
to  be  displaced  from  it. 

With  the  creation  of  the  world  or  the  solar 
system,  the  question  of  its  termination  is  naturally 
associated.     On  this   subject,  however,  I  will  not 


2/4  RECENT  CORROBORA  TIONS 

dwell  at  length,  because  the  support  here  afforded 
by  scientific  opinion  is  given  to  the  Scriptures  of 
the  New  Testament,  rather  than  the  Old.  To  refer 
again  to  Dr.  Whewell.  In  a  passage  of  extraor- 
dinary grandeur,  he  delivered  (I  think  it  was  in  a 
sermon)  his  opinion  that  the  world  would  end  with 
a  catastrophe,  instead  of  dying  what  is  termed  a 
natural  death.  Such,  as  we  know,  is  the  emphatic 
declaration  of  the  inspired  Word.  "The  day  of 
the  Lord  will  come  as  a  thief  in  the  night :  in  the 
which  the  heavens  shall  pass  away  with  a  great 
noise,  and  the  elements  shall  melt  with  fervent 
heat  ;  the  earth  also,  and  the  works  that  are 
therein,  shall  be  burned  up"  (3  Peter  3  :  10,  12). 
And  again,  "  Looking  for  and  hasting  unto  the 
coming  of  the  day  of  God,  wherein  the  heavens 
being  on  fire  shall  be  dissolved,  and  the  elements 
shall  melt  with  fervent  heat."  Such  was  the  judg- 
ment of  Dr.  Whewell  nearly  half  a  century  ago. 
His  words  were  delivered  rather  as  by  one  uttering 
his  own  firm  opinion,  than  as  expressing  the  con- 
viction of  astronomers  at  large.     Nevertheless,  as  I 


OF  SCRIPTURE.  275 

have  been  informed  on  high  authority,  it  is  now 
the  estabhshed  conclusion  of  astronomers,  based 
upon  reasoning  from  ascertained  facts,  that  the 
Galilean  fishermen  knew  what  all  the  genius  and 
learning  of  the  world  for  thousands  of  years  failed 
to  discover,  and  that — 

"  The  great  globe  itself, 
Yea,  all  which  it  inherit,  shall  dissolve."* 

III. AS    TO   THE    FLOOD   STORY. 

I  pass  now  to  the  Flood-Legend,  one  form  of 
which  has  come  down  through  Berosus  and 
Josephus,  but  which  acquires  much  more  certain 
antiquity,  and  greater  grandeur,  from  the  Inscrip- 
tions. Their  account,  says  Schrader,  whose  bias 
cannot,  I  think,  be  considered  as  friendly  towards 
the  Hebrew  record,  "brings  the  biblical  narrative 
into  much  closer  relation  with  the  Chaldean  flood- 
legend  than  could  be  assumed  on  the  basis  of  the 
tradition  in  Berosus."  ^  It  forms  part  of  the  Izdubar 
legends  discovered  by  Mr.  George  Smith,  who  pub- 

» Shakespeare,  "  Tempest,"  IV.,  i.  '  Schrader,  p.  47. 


276  RECENT  CORROBORA  TIONS 

lished  his  account  of  them  in  1872,  and  who  assigns 
to  them  a  date  anterior  to  2000  years  B.  C.  under 
the  early  Babylonian  empire.*  The  hero  of  the 
legends  is  believed  by  Mr.  Smith  to  be  the  same  as 
the  Nimrod  of  Genesis.  Like  the  Creation  Story 
of  Genesis,^  that  of  the  Flood  derives  corroboration 
from  the  Babylonian  record,  inasmuch  as  it  is  thus 
carried  back  by  an  independent  testimony  to  a  very 
great  antiquity.  That  record,  composed,  as  Mr. 
Smith  thinks,  not  long  after  the  time  of  Izdubar  or 
Nimrod,  gives  us  the  tradition  of  a  flood  which 
was  a  Divine  punishment  for  the  wickedness  of  the 
world,  and  of  a  holy  man,  who  built  an  ark,  and 
escaped  the  general  destruction.^  The  particulars 
are  set  out  in  Mr.  Smith's  volume.  They  differ,  in 
many  respects,  from  those  of  Genesis,  but  the 
essential  features  are  in  the  highest  degree  marked, 
and,  together  with  certain  of  the  details,  are  singu- 
larly accordant.*  As  in  the  case  of  the  Creation 
Story,  so  here  there  is  stamped  upon  them  the  note 

*"  Assyrian  Discoveries,"  p.  i66. 
^Ibid.,  and  204.  ^  Pages  205,  206,  seqq.  *  Pages  184,  seqq. 


OF  SCRIPTURE.  277 

of  a  common  source,  and  of  channels  of  descent 
which  separate  at  some  later  date.  In  this  case, 
however,  the  Babylonian  narrative  holds  a  higher 
position,  relatively  to  the  scriptural  record,  than  in 
the  case  of  the  Creation. 

The  hero  of  the  deluge  is  Hasisadra,  a  name 
which  has  been  Hellenized  into  Xisuthrus ;  who, 
on  the  eleventh  tablet,  relates  to  Izdubar  (the 
supposed  Nimrod)  the  story  of  the  deluge.  I 
shall  only  attempt  an  outline  presenting  the  main 
points.^ 

In  the  ancient  city  of  Surippah,  where  Anu  and 
other  great  gods  were  worshiped,  Hasisadra  was 
divinely  warned  by  Hea,  the  great  water-god,  to 
construct  a  ship,  of  which  the  size  is  named,  and 
commit  to  it  "  the  seed  of  life,  all  of  it,"  as  "  the 
sinner  and  life  "  were  about  to  be  destroyed  by  a 
flood.  Food,  furniture,  wealth,  servants,  and  ani- 
mals, were  all  to  be  embarked.  The  building  and 
loading  of  the  ship  are  then  described,  and  the  part 
taken  by  the  several  gods  in  bringing  about  the 

1  Smith,  pp.  184-194.  .  .    .. 


278  RECENT  CORROBORA  TIONS 

catastrophe.  But  "the  gods"  themselves  feared 
the  tempest,  and  "  ascended  to  the  heaven  of  Anu." 
This  deluge  lasted  for  six  days ;  on  the  seventh  all 
was  quiet.  There  is  sight  of  land  from  within  the 
vessel.  It  is  arrested  by  the  mountain  of  Nizir. 
A  dove  is  sent  forth,  and  returns.  A  swallow  is 
sent,  and  does  the  like.  A  raven  goes,  feeds  on  the 
corpses  that  are  afloat,  and  returns  not.  Then 
comes  landing,  sacrifice,  the  sending  forth  of  ani- 
mals. Ninip  and  Hea  then  remonstrate  with  Bel, 
and  suggest  other  more  usual  means  of  chastising 
men,  in  which  there  seems  to  be  some  affinity  to 
the  promise  of  Genesis  8  :  21,  22,  and  9 :  1 1-17,  that 
there  should  never  again  be  a  flood  upon  the  earth. 
And  "  then  dwelt  Hasisadra  in  a  remote  place  at 
the  mouth  of  the  rivers." 

The  resemblances  between  this  narrative  of  the 
flood  and  that  in  Genesis  are  such  as  clearly  to 
betoken  a  relationship  at  or  near  the  source.  The 
most  peculiar,  and  at  the  same  time  purely  inci- 
dental, among  all  the  details  of  the  narrative,  appears 
to  be  the  threefold  experiment  with  birds  upon  the 


OF  SCRIPTURE.  279 

decline  of  the  waters;  but  this  appears  alike  in  the 
three  narratives  of  Chaldaea,  the  Bible,  and  Berosus. 
No  other  nations  have  accounts  so  full  and  precise 
as  these.^ 

Mr.  Smith  has  some  judicious  and  impartial 
observations  on  the  two  accounts.^  The  Chaldean 
account  indicates  the  nature  of  the  country  in 
which  the  flood  took  place.  Surippah  is  near  the 
mouth  of  the  Euphrates,  and  there  Hea  was  wor- 
shiped as  the  god  of  the  deluge.  The  Hebrew 
account  has  no  local  confirmations  of  the  story. 
When  Surippah  was  conquered,  in  the  sixteenth 
century  B.  C.  or  earlier,  it  is  called  in  the  record, 
"  the  city  of  the  ark."  Hasisadra  is,  like  Noah,  a 
devout  man ;  and  the  Chaldean  deluge  is,  like  the 
Hebrew,  a  punishment  for  gross  and  widespread 
sin.  Schrader  argues  with  a  view  to  attenuate  this 
statement,  but,  as  it  appears  to  me,  in  the  spirit  of 
a  partisan  rather  than  a  judge.^  The  dimensions 
of  the  ark  vary  in  the  three  accounts ;  and  on  the 
variations   of  numerals    I    observe   elsewhere.     It 

1  Smith,  p.  212,  ^ Ibid,  'Vol.  I.,  p.  49. 


28o  RECENT  CORROBORA  TIONS 

may,  however,  be  observed,  that  the  Babylonian 
account,  which  presumably  was  written  down  from 
a  very  early  date,  and  in  a  durable  form,  has  in  this 
respect  a  great  advantage  over  oral  transmission, 
which  is  most  of  all  dangerous  for  numerical  state- 
ments. The  inscription  describes  a  regular  vessel 
with  boatmen,  another  incident  of  local  color.  The 
accounts  curiously  coincide  in  the  minute  point 
that,  both  inside  and  out,  the  ark  is  coated  with 
bitumen.  The  tablet  tells  us  that  not  eight  only, 
but  a  comparatively  large  number  of  persons,  went 
on  board.  The  Bible  gives  forty  days  as  the  dura- 
tion of  the  flood,  meaning  apparently  at  the  height. 
After  150  days  the  waters  all  abated.  The  whole 
duration  before  disappearance  is  a  year  and  ten 
days  (Gen.  7  :  11 -14,  17,  24).  The  tablet  allows 
only  seven  days  for  the  fulness  of  the  flood.  On 
the  seventh  day  all  storm  has  ceased.  Hasisadra 
then  sends  out  the  bird.  The  ship  is  stranded 
for  seven  days  more  on  the  mountains  of  Nizir,  so 
that  the  total  term  mentioned  is  one  of  only  four- 
teen days,     Nizir  lies  away  to  the  east,  far  from  the 


OF  SCRIPTURE.  2  8 1 

site  of  Ararat  mentioned  in  Genesis ;  on  the  other 
hand/  the  present  tradition  of  the  country  lands 
the  ark  at  a  site  farther  to  the  north,  and  nearer 
•  Ararat.  Again  as  to  the  birds.  In  Genesis,  Noah 
sends  out  a  raven,  which  does  not  return ;  then  a 
dove  three  times,  at  intervals  of  seven  days ;  on 
the  third  occasion  the  dove  does  not  return.  The 
inscription  sends,  first,  a  dove,  which  returns ;  then 
a  swallow,  which  returns ;  and  then  a  raven,  which 
does  not  return.  Lastly,  in  the  Bible,  Noah  lives 
after  the  flood  for  350  years  ;  the  tablet  and  Berosus 
both  assign  to  him,  associated  (rather  strangely) 
with  his  daughter  and  the  helmsman,^  that  trans- 
lation to  heaven  for  his  piety,  which  Genesis  gives 
to  Enoch.  Before  translation,  he  was  visited  by 
Izdubar,  and  the  region  was  deemed  a  sacred 
region. 

On  a  general  comparison  of  these  two  profoundly 
interesting  records,  the  result  appears  to  be  that  in 
what  is  circumstantial  only  there  is  much  difference 
along  with  some  curious  resemblance ;  but  in  the 

*  Smith,  p.  217.  'Schrader,  I.,  p.  60. 


282  RECENT  CORROBORA  TIONS 

outline  of  the  fundamental  facts,  and  in  the  moral 
considerations  applicable,  they  are  radically  at  one. 
The  wickedness  of  the  antediluvian  world,  the  Di- 
vine anger,  the  command  to  build,  the  use  of  this 
vehicle  of  escape,  and  the  erection  of  an  altar  of 
thanksgiving,  are  recorded  alike  in  both.  We  have 
no  absolute  right  to  assume  that  either  of  the  ac- 
counts, as  it  stands,  is  contemporary  with  the  period 
of  the  flood.  The  points  in  which  the  Bible  account 
may  seem  inferior  are  the  absence  of  local  coloring 
and  the  probable  relation  of  the  numerical  state- 
ments to  actual  fact.  Yet  this,  so  far  from  impair- 
ing its  claim  to  our  acceptance,  appears,  on  the 
contrary,  to  accredit  it,  because  it  is  a  feature 
which,  given  the  circumstances  of  the  case,  there 
was  reason  to  expect.  If,  indeed,  we  ride  the  hobby 
of  the  negative  criticism,  the  Bible  account  bristles 
everywhere  with  difficulty.  It  is  inconceivable  that 
the  framers  should  have  in  that  case  departed  so 
widely  from  the  inscription  in  points  so  palpable  to 
all  the  world,  or  should  have  let  slip  the  local  color, 
with  which  a  fabricator  or  late  relator  would  have 


OF  SCRIPTURE,  283 

been  forward  to  dress  up  his  narrative.  But,  if  we 
take  Abraham,  with  his  ancestors  and  his  posterity, 
as  a  nomad  people,  religious  and  of  simple  life,  such 
as  the  Bible  represents  them ;  at  an  earlier  period 
hanging  on  the  outskirts  of  the  Babylonian  power, 
at  a  later  one  migratory  towards  the  West, — it  was 
natural  for  them  to  drop  the  local  coloring  of  a 
region  with  which  all  their  relations  had  come  to 
an  end,  and  to  drop  somewhat  behind  in  the  exacti- 
tude of  some  among  the  particulars ;  and  this  is 
perhaps  observable,  as  to  the  point  of  local  color, 
not  in  the  case  of  the  flood  only,  but  throughout 
the  Abrahamic  narrative  down  to  the  entry  into  the 
promised  land. 

The  most  significant  difference  of  all  between  the 
two  records  is  that  the  inscription  is  based  upon 
polytheism,  while  in  the  Bible,  here  as  elsewhere, 
all  is  based  upon  the  doctrine  of  one  God.  That  is 
to  say,  the  simpler  form  is  the  groundwork  of  the 
Bible  narrative;  and  the  simpler  form,  according  to 
the  generally  recognized  principle,  is  that  nearest 
the  source,  most  closely  akin  to  the  occurrence  or 


284  RECENT  CORROBORATIONS 

the  original  record.  The  religion  of  Noah  agrees 
with  that  of  the  common  father,  Adam ;  the  re- 
ligion of  Hasisadra  has  departed  from  the  primitive 
belief,  and  exhibits  to  us  those  multiplied  and  de- 
teriorated images  of  the  Deity  which  human  in- 
firmity and  sin  had  introduced  or  allowed. 

While  Schrader  glances  at  the  period  when  the 
Babylonian  flood-legend  reached  the  Hebrews  as 
that  of  "the  prophetic  narrator  of  early  biblical 
history,"  he  candidly  adds,  "  I  am  led  to  the  ob- 
vious conclusion  that  the  Hebrews  were  acquainted 
with  this  legend  at  a  much  earlier  period,  and  that 
it  is  far  from  impossible  that  they  acquired  a  knowl- 
edge of  these  and  the  other  primitive  myths  now 
under  investigation  as  far  back  as  in  the  time  of 
their  earlier  settlements  in  Babylonia,  and  that 
they  carried  these  stories  with  them  from  Ur  of 
the  Chaldees."  For  him  they  are  all  myths ;  the 
original  invention  is  in  Babylonia,  and  the  Hebrews 
are  early  copyists.  For  others,  however,  they  are 
in  the  nature  of  primitive  traditions,  founded  on 
histories ;  and  the  twin  versions  bear  testimony  by 


OF  SCRIPTURE.  2%% 

their  concurrence,  and  even  in  some  respects  by 
their  discrepancies,  to  their  historical  character.  If 
there  was  remolding,  it  may  be  the  more  detailed 
and  circumstantial  narration  which  is  presumptively 
entitled  to  the  credit  of  it;  and  the  Bible  story, 
more  sparing  in  its  details,  but  far  broader  and 
more  direct  in  the  terrible  lesson  it  conveys,  may 
reasonably  be  judged  to  have  come  down  from  the 
source  with  the  smallest  amount  of  variation  in  es- 
sentials from  the  original.  It  is  here  as  elsewhere. 
*'  The  wisdom  of  this  world,"  the  race  favored  with 
stable  institutions,  and  with  intellectual  develop- 
ment, yet  fails  in  the  firmness  of  its  hold,  and  the 
clearness  of  its  view,  where  the  appreciation  of  the 
tremendous  moral  lesson  is  concerned  ;  while 
the  race  of  wandering  shepherds,  who  are  but  the 
"  babes  and  sucklings  "  of  intelligence,  yet  transmit 
that  lesson  in  a  type  so  fresh  and  clear  that  our 
Lord  has  only  to  quote  and  enlarge  without  cor- 
recting it,  and  so  to  launch  it  anew  into  the  world 
as  a  solemn  chapter  of  his  gospel  teaching. 

It  may  be  noticed  that  the  translation  to  heaven 


286  RECENT  CORROBORATIONS 

of  Hasisadra,  the  Noah  of  the  tablets,  is  in  curious 
accordance  with  that  far  larger  development  both 
of  the  Underworld  and  of  the  future  state,  which 
marks  alike  the  Babylonian  and  the  Egyptian  sys- 
tems in  comparison  with  that  of  the  Old  Testa- 
ment, and  forms  an  interesting  but  separate  subject 
of  discussion. 

The  Hebrew  story  of  the  Deluge  has  long  been 
supported  by  a  diversity  of  traditions  among 
nations  and  races  of  the  world,  but  never  before 
with  such  particularity,  or  such  corroboration  in 
the  sense  and  to  the  extent  before  described.  But 
though  we  have  now  a  new  and  important  witness 
in  court  on  our  behalf,  yet  undoubtedly,  if  the  nar- 
rative be  provably  untrue,  the  testimony  of  both, 
or  of  any  number  of  traditional  witnesses,  must 
fall  to  the  ground. 

The  voice  of  natural  science  has  not  been,  and 
probably  is  not  at  present,  uniform  on  this  subject. 
The  negative  has  just  been  presented  to  the  world, 
of  course  with  great  ability,  and  also  in  a  suffi- 
ciently  magisterial    form,   by    Professor     Huxley. 


OF  SCRIPTURE.  287 

He  conceives  that  Christian  theology  must  stand 
or  fall  with  the  historical  trustworthiness  of  the 
Jewish  Scriptures  ;  ^  and,  as  these  are  not  trust- 
worthy, the  consequence  is  that  it  must  not  stand, 
but  fall.  With  this  general  proposition  I  have  here 
nothing  to  do. 

Mr.  Huxley  selects  the  flood-story  for  the  capital 
article  of  his  indictment.  But  he  treats  it  as  little 
worthy  of  serious  notice.  "  It  is  difficult  to  per- 
suade serious  scientific  inquirers  to  occupy  them- 
selves in  any  way  with  the  Noachian  deluge."^ 
He  finds,  indeed,  a  sort  of  historic  nucleus  for  a 
partial  deluge  in  the  occasional  desolating  floods 
of  the  Euphrates  and  Tigris.^  But,  be  it  a  partial 
or  be  it  a  general  flood,  he  applies  the  same  con- 
temptuous negative  doctrine  to  the  deluge  :  per- 
haps most  of  all  to  what  he  terms  a  particularly 
absurd  attempt  at  reconciliation,  which  places  it 
"at  the  end  of  the  glacial  epoch."*  I  am  far  from 
intending  to   enter   upon   a   controversy,  which    I 

*  Nineteenth  Century,  July,  1890,  p.  8. 
2  Page  12.  3  Page  14.  *  Page  13. 


28S  RECENT  CORROBORA  TIONS 

have  no  capacity  to  handle.  Yet  I  may  be  bold 
enough  to  mention,  that,  while  Mr.  Huxley  is 
speaking  in  the  name  of  science  at  large,  some 
votaries  of  science  hold  an  entirely  different  lan- 
guage. Moreover,  that  the  idea  of  a  flood  was  not 
thus  summarily  dismissed  by  the  luminaries  of  the 
scientific  world  anterior  to  the  present  day ;  and 
that  the  grounds  of  this  dismissal  are  not  of  recent 
discovery,  but  were  fully  open  to  the  geologists  of 
the  last  generation.  Quite  recently,  the  doctrine 
of  a  deluge  has  been  maintained  by  Sir  J.  Dawson,^ 
by  Mr.  Howorth,  and  by  the  Duke  of  Argyll  (if  I 
interpret  him  aright),^  all  of  whom  are,  I  suppose, 
to  be  considered  as  "serious  scientific  inquirers." 

Mr.  Howorth,  in  his  learned  and  laborious  work 
on  "The  Mammoth  and  the  Flood,"  is  certainly  not 
bound  by  any  superstitious  reverence  for  the  mere 
text  of  the  Book  of  Genesis ;  for,  in  his  preface,^  he 
seems  to  cast  aside  as  null  its  traditions  respecting 
all  that  preceded  the  creation  of  man.    His  treatise 

1 "  Modern  Science  in  Bible  Lands,"  p.  252. 

'  In  The  Scottish  Geographical  Magazine,  April,  1890. 

'  Page's  ix,  x. 


OF  SCRIPTURE.  289 

collects  largely  not  only  the  diluvial  traditions  of  so 
many  races  and  countries,  but  an  immense  mass  of 
palaeontological  evidence ;  and,  having  laid  this 
wide  ground  for  his  induction,  he  declares  that, 
in  his  judgment,  the  whole  points  unmistakably 

"  To  a  widespread  calamity,  involving  a  flood  on  a  great 
scale.  I  do  not  see  how  the  historian,  the  archaeologist,  and 
the  palaeontologist,  can  avoid  making  this  conclusion  in 
future  a  prime  factor  in  their  discussions,  and  I  venture  to 
think  that  before  long  it  will  be  accepted  as  unanswerable."  ^ 

Moreover,  I  am  free  to  consider  history  no  less 
a  science,  though  a  less  determinate  science,  than 
geology  or  biology ;  and  I  quote  in  conclusion  the 
following  passage  from  Lenormant,  which  follows 
a  copious  collection  of  testimonies  to  the  tradition 
of  a  deluge  in  almost  all  lands : 

*'  La  longue  revue,  a  laquelle  nous  venons  de  nous  livrer, 
nous  permit  d'affirmer  que  le  recit  du  deluge  est  une  tradi- 
tion universelle  dans  tous  les  rameaux  de  I'humanite,  a 
I'exception  toutefois  de  la  race  noire.  Mais  un  souvenir 
partout,  aussi  precis  et  aussi  concordant,  ne  saurait  etre 
celui  d'un  mythe  invente  a  plaisir ;  aucun  mythe  religieux 

1  Page  463. 
19 


290  RECENT  CORK  OB  ORA  TIONS 

ou  cosmogonique  ne  presente  ce  caractere  d'universalite. 
C'est  necessairement  le  souvenir  d'un  evenement  reel  et 
terrible,  qui  frappa  assez  puissamment  I'imagination  des 
ancetres  de  notre  espece  pour  n'etre  jamais  oublie  de  leurs 
descendants.  Ce  cataclysme  se  produisit  pres  du  berceau 
primitif  de  I'humanite."  ^ 

IV. AS   TO   THE    GREAT    DISPERSION. 

The  contents  of  the  tenth  chapter  of  Genesis 
constitute  a  document  of  a  character  altogether 
extraordinary :  for  example,  in  the  two  following 
particulars.  First,  it  is  without  parallel  in  the 
world.  Nowhere  else  is  there  known  to  us  a  dis- 
tinct and  detailed  endeavor  to  draw  downwards 
from  a  single  source  the  multiplication  of  men  in 

1 "  Les  Origines  de  I'Histoire,"  pp.  489,  490,  Second  edition,  1880. 
"  The  long  review,  to  which  we  have  just  apphed  ourselves,  warrants 
our  affirming  that  the  tale  of  the  Deluge  is  a  universal  tradition 
among  all  the  branches  of  the  human  family ;  excepting,  however, 
the  blacks.  But  a  remembrance  prevailing  everywhere,  so  precise 
and  so  concordant,  cannot  belong  to  a  myth  arbitrarily  invented.  No 
religious  or  cosmognic  myth  presents  such  a  character  of  universality. 
It  must  of  necessity  be  a  recollection  of  a  great  and  terrible  occur- 
rence, which  impressed  the  imagination  of  the  ancestors  of  our  race 
so  powerfully  as  never  to  have  been  forgotten  by  their  descendants. 
That  cataclysm  took  place  at  a  spot  near  the  primeval  cradle  of 
humanity.'" 


OF  SCRIPTURE,  29 1 

the  earth  by  families,  and  the  distribution  of  them 
over  the  face  of  the  earth.  Secondly,  this  account, 
containing  seventy-two  names  of  men  (to  which 
more  are  added  in  connection  with  the  descent  of 
Abram  when  we  reach  chapter  12),  is  so  particular, 
that  the  notion  of  its  correct  transmission  by  ordi- 
nary means  may  appear  to  present  much  difficulty. 
Abram,  when  he  migrated  westward,  came  from  a 
country  which  we  now  know  to  have  possessed  in 
his  time  means  of  durable  record ;  but,  as  the  head 
of  a  nomad  family,  he  could  hardly  have  carried 
with  him  written  traditions  :  and  a  specific  narra- 
tive of  this  kind,  like  the  Greek  Catalogue  in  the 
"  Iliad,"  presented  great  difficulties  in  the  way  of 
oral  transmission  through  several,  perhaps  many, 
generations,  down  to  the  time  when  we  may 
reasonably  suppose  the  children  of  Israel  to  have 
acquired  the  art  of  writing  during  their  sojourn  in 
Egypt.  The  assisting  providence  of  God  may 
suggest  itself  to  the  believing  mind  as  having  sup- 
plied the  needful  measure  of  that  aid,  which  Homer 
(Iliad  II.,  484)  besought,  in  a  kindred  case,  from 


292  RECENT  CORK  OB  OR  A  TIONS 

the  Muses.  But  the  document,  if  thus  considered, 
lays  a  certain  weight  upon  our  faculty  of  belief, 
and  even  offers  a  tempting  invitation  to  assault 
from  those  who  are  adversely  minded.  This  weight, 
however,  is  converted  at  once  into  a  prop,  into  a  •■ 
buttress  which  well  and  stoutly  supports  the  wall, 
when  we  find  that  this  singular  and,  so  to  speak, 
exposed  tradition  has  received  in  the  most  fun- 
damental and  vital  points,  from  the  researches  of 
philological  and  of  historical  science,  striking  and, 
we  may  suppose,  conclusive  confirmation. 

The  foundation  of  the  arrangement  is  the  three- 
fold division  of  the  human  race  from  a  certain 
period  of  its  history.  If  such  a  division  actually 
took  place,  we  might  expect  to  find  the  traces  of  it 
in  a  threefold  division  of  language,  which  has  an 
unquestionable  relation  to  race;  and,  conversely, 
such  a  divarication  in  language  proves  an  early 
distribution  of  races  or  families,  from  which  it 
took  its  origin.  Without  entering  into  details,  it 
may  be  observed  that  the  Book  of  Genesis  asso- 
ciates the  first  distinctions  of  language  with   the 


OF  SCRIPTURE.  293 

local  dispersion  of  man;  and  it  is  now  known 
that,  in  days  antecedent  to  the  permanent  bond  of 
literature,  such  an  association  is  agreeable  not  only 
to  probability,  but  to  the  ascertained  laws  of  ex- 
perience. And  now  we  find  that  comparative 
philology,  dealing  at  large  with  the  languages  of 
the  world,  has  resolved  them  into  that  very  three- 
fold division,  which  the  distribution  of  man  accord- 
ing to  Genesis  10,  into  three  great  branches,  antici- 
pates and  requires.  Here  is  again  an  important 
service,  rendered  by  modern  science  to  belief 

It  is  true  that  the  Bible  (Gen.  ii  :  i)  speaks  of 
language  as  originally  one,  and  that  this  proposi- 
tion has  not  yet  been  generally  affirmed  by  phi- 
lology. Yet  the  way  to  it  has  been  opened,  and  it 
need  excite  no  surprise  should  the  goal  be  soon 
attained.  Professor  Max  Miiller,  I  believe,  says 
there  is  no  proof  that  the  Ar>^an,  Semitic,  and 
Turanian  families  of  language  had  independent 
beeihnincrs  ;  that  radicals  existing  in  all  the  three 
can  be  traced  to  the  common  source,  and  that  even 
the  grammars  may  have  been  originally  one.     But 


294  RECENT  CORK  OB  OR  A  TIONS 

this  subject  still  awaits  its  scientific  elucidation 
or  decision. 

The  Table  of  Peoples  presents  on  its  surface 
some  apparent  anomalies ;  of  which,  however,  a 
rational  account  can  be  given,  and  one  which  for 
the  most  part  converts  them  into  evidences  in  its 
favor.  For  instance,  the  Hamitic  portion  presents 
to  us  out  of  a  total  of  thirty  names  no  less  than 
eighteen  which  are  plural  words,  and  which  are 
therefore  national  or  tribal,  while  only  two  of  the 
same  class  are  found  in  the  rest  of  the  account. 
But  this  seems  upon  consideration  to  illustrate  what 
we  know  from  history ;  namely,  that  the  Hamitic 
races  exhibited  the  most  precocious  development, 
and  set  up  the  earliest  known  civilizations  of  the 
world,  those  of   Babylonia  and  of   Egypt. 

Again  :  the  Cushite  stock,  after  its  regular  order 
is  arrested  in  verse  7  of  the  chapter,  jumps  as  it 
were  down  to  Nimrod  in  verses  8-10.  But  we  must 
bear  in  mind  the  greatness  assigned  to  his  individual 
position.  He  is  the  only  person  in  the  Table  who 
is  described  as  founding  a  kingdom,  and  the  ac- 


OF  SCRIPTURE.  295 

count  of  him  has  a  great  resemblance  to  that  of 
Izdubar  in  the  Assyrian  Tablets,  with  whom  he  is 
identified  by  Mr.  George  Smith. 

Again,  as  Shem,  Ham,  and  Japheth  are  four  times 
mentioned  together,  and  invariably  in  this  order,  it 
seems  to  follow  naturally  that  this  is  the  order  of 
their  ages.  In  chapter  10,  however,  their  descend- 
ants are  set  out  in  the  inverse  order,  and  Japheth 
takes  precedence.  But  this  also,  upon  reflection,  we 
may  find  to  be  quite  natural.  Migration  was  largely 
connected  with  considerations  of  space  and  food. 
It  may  be  that  the  younger  had  to  give  place  to  the 
elder,  and  that  the  children  of  Japheth  had  on  this 
account  to  be  the  fir^t  in  moving  from  the  com- 
mon center. 

Further:  in  the  Japhetic  line  the  genealogy 
wholly  stops  with  the  next  generation  but  one, 
whereas,  it  is  continued  farther,  not  only  in  the 
Semitic  line,  which  had  to  be  connected  with 
Abram,  but  also  in  the  Hamitic,  by  the  mention 
of  Nimrod  and  of  the  Philistines.  This,  however, 
seems  pei-fecdy  natural  if  the  line  of  Japheth,  as  is 


296  RECENT  CORR  OB  OR  A  TIONS 

probable,  moved  the  first,  and,  as  is  manifest,  went 
the  farthest,  so  as  to  be  out  of  sight  of  the  narra- 
tor, while  descendants  of  Shem  and  Ham  remained 
locally  in  contact  with  each  other.  KnobeP  has 
observed  that  in  each  of  the  three  branches  the 
enumeration  begins  with  those  who  traveled  to  the 
greatest  distance  from  the  common  center  (which 
is  taken  by  him  to  be  near  Mount  Ararat),  and 
accordingly  the  Japhetites  are  reckoned  from  the 
north-west,  the  Semites  from  the  south-east,  and 
Hamites  from  the  south-west.  Just  as  in  the  case 
of  the  Homeric  Catalogue,^  this  methodical  arrange- 
ment probably  gave  great  assistance  to  the  memory 
of  the  first  recorder. 

Knobel  has  discussed  with  great  minuteness  and 
care  the  particular  names  of  the  recital,  and  he 
traces  them  to  their  historic  seats.  Bishop  Browne, 
in  the  "Speaker's  Commentary,"  has  entered  on  the 
same  field.  Some  examples  may  be  given.  The 
Japhetites  are  those  (Japhah)  of  fair  complexion. 

"Volkertafel  der  Genesis."     Giessen.    1850.     Page  14. 
2  "  Juventus  Mundi,"  p.  467. 


OF  SCRIPTURE.  297 

They  take  to  the  isles  or  coast-lands/  the  seaward 
countries  of  the  north  and  west.  Here  we  meet 
the  name  of  Gomer  reproduced  in  the  Cimmerians, 
Cimbri,  and  Cwmry.  Ashkenaz,  the  son  of  Gomer, 
is  found  in  Scandinavia,^  the  Scangia  of  Jornandus, 
the  chief  seat  of  the  German  stock.  Another  route 
is  marked  in  the  same  direction  by  Ascania,^  in  Asia 
Minor,  a  name  fouifd  at  various  points  of  that  region. 
Knobel  thinks  there  is  a  trace  of  the  Teutonic  race 
in  Teuthras,  a  name  found  on  both  sides  in  the  war 
of  the  Iliad.^  He  proceeds  with  the  list  of  Japhet- 
ites  as  follows.  Riphath,  he  thinks,  is  traced  in  the 
Carpathian  country,^  Togarma  in  Armenia,  Magog 
in  the  Slavs,  Madai  in  the  Medes,  Javan  in  the 
laones  or  lonians,  Elisa  in  Cohans,  Tarshish  in 
the  Tursenoi,  Kittim  in  the  Chitians  of  Cyprus, 
Dodanim  in  the  Dardanians,  Tubal  in  the  Iberians, 
Meshech  in  the  Meschi  or  Moschi,  Tiras  in  the 
Thracians  (Thrax  or  Thras).^  Some  among  these 
particular  interpretations — for  instance,  that  given 

1  See  Revised  Version,  Gen.  10  :  5.         '  Knobel,  ibid.^  pp.  35-37. 

•  Page  39.         *  Iliad,  V.  705  and  VI.  13.        ^  Knobel,  ibid.,  p.  44. 

«  Pages  53,  60,  71,  ^^,  81,  95,  117,  123. 


298  RECENT  CORK  OB  OR  A  TIONS 

to  Elisa — may  be  untenable.  Bishop  Browne^  sets 
out  the  various  opinions  that  have  been  held,  mostly 
without  declaring  a  preference.  It  is  not,  however, 
the  accuracy  of  each  particular  identification,  nor 
even  of  every  particular  item  of  the  text,  but  the 
principles  of  the  general  arrangement,  and  the 
large  number  of  cases  reasonably  clear,  which  give 
the  subject  its  importance.  * 

The  Semitic  and  Hamitic  branches  offer  less  dif- 
ficulty to  the  investigator.  No  part  of  the  tracking 
is  more  satisfactory  than  that  which  relates  to  the 
nations  of  Palestine,  and  to  the  names  of  Canaan, 
Sidon,  and  Heth,  where  every  particular,  known  to 
us  from  independent  history  or  tradition,  supports, 
so  far  as  I  can  judge,  in  a  most  remarkable  manner, 
the  trustworthiness  of  the  record.  Speaking  gen- 
erally, perhaps  no  one  can  go -farther  than  Knobel 
in  the  work  of  identification.  His  treatise  has  be- 
come a  considerable  authority,  and  is  of  the  greater 
value  because  he  does  not  belong  to  the  conserva- 
tive school  of  criticism  on  the  Old  Testament. 

1  *'  Speaker's  Commentary,"  Genesis,  in  loco. 


OF  SCRIPTURE,  299 

V. AS   TO   THE   SINAITIC   JOURNEY. 

In  his  "  Modern  Science  in  Bible  Lands,"  Sir  J. 
Dawson  has  examined,  with  elaborate  care,  first  the 
dwelling-place  of  the  Israelites  in  Egypt,  and  their 
probable  route  fi-om  it  until  they  cross  the  Yam 
Suph ;  and  then,  still  more  particularly,  the  account 
of  their  journeyings  beyond  the  Red  Sea.  His 
conclusion  is  that  they  crossed  at  a  point  ^  now 
forming  part  of  the  Bitter  Lakes  of  the  Isthmus, 
but  then  a  part  of  the  Red  Sea  itself,  which  was 
fed  in  ancient  times  by  a  branch  of  the  Nile  flow- 
ing eastwards.^  Yam  Suph,  or  sea  of  weeds,  is  the 
name  given  to  it  in  the  Bible.^ 

Beyond  the  Red  Sea,  and  onwards  to  the  Sinaitic 
region,  the  country  has  been  surveyed  by  officers 
of  the  British  Ordnance.  All  the  instruments  of 
modern  science  have  been  employed;  the  results 
have  been  published  on  a  large  scale ;  and  the 
effect,  as  reported  by  Sir  J.  Dawson,  has  been 
"  entire  agreement  of  the  members  of  the  party  on 
essential  points;"*  and  the  ascertainment  of  such 

1  Page  389.        2  Page  392.         ^  Page  404.         *  Pages  371,  406. 


300  RECENT  CORROBORATIONS 

complete  coincidence  of  the  actual  features  of  the 
country  with  the  requirements  of  the  Mosaic  nar- 
rative as  to  prove  it  to  be  a  contemporary  record 
of  the  events  to  which  it  relates/ 

The  route  pursued  by  the  Israelites  down  the 
coast  of  the  Red  Sea,  and  then  to  the  eastward,  was 
peculiar,  as  it  seems  to  have  been  dictated  by  a 
combination  of  strategical  considerations  with  those 
which  concerned  the  subsistence  of  the  people,  and 
especially  the  supply  of  water.  The  local  indica- 
tions are  on  this  account  all  the  more  remarkable. 
It  is  not  possible,  without  exceeding  the  limits 
proper  for  the  present  observations,  to  convey 
the  full  force  of  the  evidence  which  shows  how 
the  stamp  of  Egypt  was  impressed  both  upon  the 
Israelites  themselves,  and  upon  the  narrative  in 
Exodus  of  their  escape ;  inasmuch  as  it  depends 
on  the  details  of  measurement,  atmosphere,  water 
supply,  and  other  physical  circumstances,  and  upon 
their  relation  to  the  Mosaic  narrative.  The  con- 
clusions reached  have  no  direct  bearing  upon  the 

1  "  Modern  Science  in  Bible  Lands,"  p.  407. 


OF  SCRIPTURE,  301 

proofs  of  a  Divine  revelation  through  the  Scrip- 
tures, but  they  are  of  great  historical  importance 
in  establishing  the  credit  of  the  Book,  and  its  con- 
temporaneous characte)  a.s  to  the  substance  of  its 
contents. 


VII. 

CONCLUSION, 

In  closing  this  series  of  papers,  it  is  right  to 
record  the  admission  that  they  can  lay  no  claim  to 
anything  more  than  touching,  and  that  but  slightly, 
certain  parts  of  a  great  subject.  They  omit  many 
things  important,  perhaps  some  things  essential. 
The  essay  on  the  Creation  Story,  indeed,  aims  at 
bringing  out,  in  lieu  of  simple  apology,  what  seems 
to  me  a  distinct  and  specific  argument  in  proof  of 
a  Divine  Revelation.  Except  in  that  instance, 
their  main  design  is  to  draw  out,  so  far  as  they  go, 
the  force  of  that  cumulative  evidence  witnessing 
to  such  a  Revelation,  which  has  been  so  wisely 
summed  up  by  Bishop  Butler ;  ^  and  also  to  disem- 
barrass belief  in   it  from  those   difficulties  which 

1"  Analogy,"  Part  II.,  Chap.  VII. 
302 


CONCLUSION.  303 

properly  belong  not  to  itself,  but  to  exaggerations 
and  excrescences  against  which  it  can  carry  no 
absolute  guarantee.  They  form  the  testimony  of 
an  old  man,  in  the  closing  period  of  his  life.  It  is 
rendered  with  no  special  qualification  but  possibly 
this  one.  Few  persons  of  our  British  race  have 
lived  through  a  longer  period  of  incessant  argu- 
mentative contention,  or  have  had  a  more  diversified 
experience  in  trying  to  ascertain,  for  purposes 
immediately  practical,  the  difference  between  ten- 
able and  untenable  positions.  Such  experience  is 
directly  conversant  with  the  nature  of  man  and  his 
varied  relations ;  and  I  own  my  inclination  to  sup- 
pose that  it  is  more  germane  to  the  treatment  of 
subjects  that  lie  directly  between  collective  man 
and  the  Author  of  his  being,  more  calculated  to 
neutralize  deficiencies,  though  not  to  impart 
capacity,  than  a  familiarity  with  those  material 
sciences  which  have  supplied  an  arena  for,  perhaps, 
the  most  splendid  triumphs  of  the  century  now  far 
advanced  in  its  decline.  On  this  subject  has  been 
recorded   the    nobly    candid    admission    of    Mr. 


304  CONCLUSION, 

Darwin/  respecting  the  possible  atrophy,  through 
disuse,  of  the  mental  organs  on  which  our  higher 
tastes  depend.  Among  those  organs  I  cannot  but 
include  the  organ  of  belief.  On  this  subject,  how- 
ever, I  am  a  biased  witness.  It  is  for  others  to 
judge.  I  only  offer  a  plea,  not  in  proof  of  ability, 
but  only  in  extenuation  of  defect. 

There  is  in  certain  circles  a  very  confident  dispo- 
sition to  assert  that,  as  regards  belief  in  super- 
naturalism,  the  intellectual  battle  has  been  fought 
and  won,  and  that  victory  is  on  the  side  of  nega- 
tion. It  ought  to  be  observed,  before  proceeding 
further,  that  supernaturalism  is  a  term  which 
includes  the  idea  of  God.  A  sense  may  be,  indeed, 
loosely  given  to  it,  which  confines  it  to  the  mode 
of  his  manifestations.  But,  essentially,  if  God  be 
there,  the  supernatural  is  there ;  and  the  develop- 
ments which  proceed  from  that  idea,  even  if  they 
had  been  crushed  and  stamped  out,  might  germi- 
nate again.  It  is  not,  then,  a  question  of  excres- 
cences or  of  details ;  the  life  and  essence  of  religion 

l"Life  and  Letters,"  Vol.  I.,  pp.  loi,  102. 


CONCLUSION,  305 

are  at  stake.  It  is  the  question  of  belief  in  what 
is  not  perhaps  scientifically,  but  yet  intelligibly, 
termed  a  personal  God. 

I  shall  presently  enter  on  the  moral  causes  which 
may  have  contributed,  and  even  mainly  contributed, 
to  stimulate  the  negative  tendencies  of  the  day.  I 
am  now  only  endeavoring  partially  to  test  the 
justice  of  a  paean,  which  is  not  warranted  even  by 
the  estabtished  fact  of  a  victory.  The  paean  of  the 
victor  is  the  epitaph  of  the  vanquished :  and  the 
victory,  which  is  to  warrant  it,  must  be  a  victory 
belonging  to  that  class  of  victories  which  end 
the  war. 

That  such  a  song  of  triumph  is  raised  there  can 
be  little  doubt.  It  seems  to  have  inspired  the 
recent  articles  of  that  very  distinguished  and  not 
less  upright  writer,  Professor  Huxley,  in  the  Nine- 
teenth Century.  But  I  have  never  seen  a  better 
example  of  the  plenary  satisfaction  which  possesses 
the  mind  of  many  among  the  negative  athletes 
than  in  the  following  passage,  taken  from  a  writer 

of  ability: 

20 


306  CONCLUSION. 

"  I  set  out  from  the  standpoint  that  the  mission  of  Free- 
thought  is  no  longer  to  batter  down  old  faiths.  That  has 
been  long  ago  effectively  accomplished ;  and  I,  for  one,  am 
ready  to  put  a  railing  round  the  ruins,  that  they  may  be 
preserved  from  desecration,  and  serve  as  a  landmark !  In- 
deed, I  confess  to  having  yawned  over  a  recent  vigorous 
indictment  of  Christianity."^ 

This  purports  to  be  a   description  of  a  certain 

state  of  facts.^     Now,  it  is  not  the  first  time  that 

we  have   heard  description   of  the  kind.     Such  a 

description  was  supplied  in  an  earlier  time  by  no 

less  a  person  than  Bishop  Butler,  who,  I  apprehend, 

was  not  among  those  given  to  exaggeration.     His 

words  are  these  :^ 

"  It  is  come,  I  know  not  how,  to  be  taken  for  granted  by 
many  persons  that  Christianity  is  not  so  much  as  a  subject 
of  inquiry;  but  that  it  is  now  at  length  discovered  to  be 
fictitious.    And,  accordingly,  they  treat  it  as  if,  in  the  present 

1  Karl  Pearson,  "  Ethics  of  Freethought,"  Preface,  p.  5.  The  dra- 
matic character  of  this  declaration  is  brought  to  its  climax  by  the 

>  fact  that  the  work  is  dedicated  to  the  members  of  King's  College, 
Cambridge, 

2  It  is  far  from  being  isolated.  The  same  ideas  are  expressed  with 
greater  vehemence  by  Dr.  Hardwick,  of  Sheffield,  in  a  preface  to 
•'  Evolution,"     London.    1890. 

3  From  the  Advertisement  to  the  "  Analogy." 


CONCLUSION,  307 

age,  this  were  an  agreed  point  among  all  people  of  discern- 
ment, and  nothing  remained  but  to  set  it  up  as  a  principal 
subject  of  mirth  and  ridicule  ;  as  it  were  by  way  of  reprisals, 
for  its  having  so  long  interrupted  the  pleasures  of  the  world." 

It  seems  pretty  plain  that  at  the  time  when  the 
Bishop  published  the  "Analogy  "^  a  wave  of  unbelief 
was  passing  over  the  land.  The  spiritual  declension 
of  the  Hanoverian  period  had  set  in ;  and  the 
standard  of  life,  and  of  the  ideas  current  concern- 
ing life,  was  sinking  almost  from  day  to  day.  The 
negative  movement  of  the  period  may  have  been 
quite  as  vigorous,  as  widespread,  and  as  self-confi- 
dent, as  that  of  which  we  now  feel  the  pressure. 
Yet  it  dwindled,  and  almost  disappeared ;  and  we 
may  even  say  that,  at  the  time  of  Johnson's  social 
predominance,  it  left  hardly  a  trace  behind.^     Nor 

1  In  1736. 
2  In  1797,  when  Wilberforce  published  his  "Practical  View,"  he 
spoke  of  "absolute  unbelievers"  as  a  class  which  he  feared  was  an 
increasing  one  (Chap.  VII.,  sect.  3).  Perhaps  the  great  war  of  the 
years  1793-1815  tended  to  debilitate  the  religious  mind  of  the  country 
by  drawing  off  mental  force  in  another  direction.  I  have,  however, 
heard  from  persons  of  high  authority,  who  were  old  when  I  was 
young,  that  the  French  Revolution  generated  a  distinctly  religious 
reaction  on  this  side  of  the  Channel. 


308  CONCLUSION. 

was  this  either  the  first  or  the  last  of  the  reverses 
which  negation  has  suffered.  At  the  time  of  the 
great  Renascence  of  ancient  learning  in  the  fifteenth 
and  sixteenth  centuries,  the  cultivated  mind  of 
Europe  sank  far  back  into  Paganism ;  but  that  ebb 
was  succeeded  by  a  flowing  tide.  Again,  in  my 
own  earlier  days,  say  in  the  second  quarter  of  the 
present  century,  there  was  a  great  revival,  both  of 
the  dogmatic  sense  and  of  the  religious  life  in 
England;  and  the  temper  of  the  time,  in  the 
thinking  world,  was  strongly  adverse  alike  to 
worldliness,  to  indifference,  and  to  unbelief.  No 
man,  perhaps,  was  better  qualified  to  pass  a  judg- 
ment on  this  subject  than  the  late  Dr.  Whewell ; 
and  he,  writing  in  November,  1853,  and  referring  to 
an  opinion  expressed  by  a  contemporary  of  smaller 
caliber  than  himself,  says,  "As  to  his  assertion  that 
skepticism  is  increasing,  it  is  contrary  to  all  my 
knowledge  of  the  cultivated  classes."  ^  But  as  the 
third  quarter  proceeded,  the  skeptical  movement  set 
in  with  a  wide  and  subtle  power.     History,  then, 

1 "  Life  of  Whewell,"  p.  431. 


CONCLUSION,  309 

seems  to  prove  that  these  negative  movements  are 
subject  not  only  to  a  hazard,  but  even  to  a  law,  of 
mutation ;  and  that  every  one  of  them,  when  it  has 
done  its  work,  may  cease  to  be.  Of  one  thing  we 
may  be  assured  :  such  a  movement  derives  no  real 
strength,  no  true  promise  of  permanence,  from  an 
overweening  self-assertion.  The  question  is  not 
what  negation  thinks  of  itself  and  of  the  opposing 
forces,  but  what  is  the  intrinsic  strength  of  the 
reasoning  on  which  it  rests. 

I  have  said  that,  when  it  has  done  its  work,  it 
may  cease  to  be.  For  doubtless  it  has  a  work  to 
do.  The  wave  that  breaks  and  foams  upon  the 
rock  exhibits  to  us  not  merely,  as  it  might  seem, 
a  picture  of  violence  and  a  source  of  danger,  but  a 
fraction  of  the  vast  oceanic  movement,  which  is  the 
indispensable  condition  of  health  and  purity  both 
to  the  water  and  the  air,  and  to  the  populations  by 
which  they  are  respectively  inhabited.  If  we  be- 
lieve in  Providential  government,  we  might  ration- 
ally believe,  even  where  we  did  not  see,  that  those 
boastful,  and  even  powerful,  agencies  are  not  with- 


3IO  CONCLUSION. 

out  their  purposes  prefigured,  and  bounded  too,  in 
the  counsels  of  God.  It  seems,  however,  not  diffi- 
cult to  discern  a  portion  of  those  purposes ;  which 
may  have  been,  first,  to  dispel  the  lethargy  and 
stimulate  the  zeal  of  believers;  and,  secondly,  to 
admonish  their  faith  to  keep  terms  with  reason,  by 
testing  it  at  all  its  points ;  lest  fancy,  or  pride,  or 
indolence,  or  the  intolerant  spirit  of  sect  or  party, 
should  have  imported  into  their  beliefs  merely 
human  elements  that  it  may  be  very  needful  to 
eject. 

While  leaving  to  the  champions  of  negation 
their  title,  whatever  it  may  be,  to  insist  on  the 
utter  blindness  of  behef,  this  at  least  I  urge  upon 
them :  they  ought  to  understand  that  it  remains 
just  as  possible  now  as  it  was  in  the  early  or  mid- 
dle ages,  to  uphold  belief  in  perfect  good  faith  and 
with  immovable  conviction.  In  the  advance  of 
scientific  knowledge,  and  of  the  critical  art,  I  for 
one  see  much  that  corrects  and  chastens  what  was 
temporary  or  accidental  in  our  persuasions  con- 
cerning the   subjects   of  belief,  but   nothing  that 


CONCLUSION.  311 

disintegrates  or  undermines  the  basis  of  belief  it- 
self;  much,  on  the  contrary,  that  confirms  it. 

It  is  sometimes  taken  for  granted  or  alleged,  that 
religion  or  its  champions  are  reduced  to  the  ne- 
cessity of  defending  their  cause  only  with  arms 
which  have  been  superseded,  either  by  the  intro- 
duction of  forces  previously  unknown,  or  by  new 
forms  of  construction  better  adapted  to  their  ends. 
In  a  spirit  which  seems  to  fluctuate  between  pity 
and  a  good-natured  contempt,  Professor  Huxley  de- 
scribes "the  old-fashioned  artillery  of  the  churches," 
on  the  one  side,  and  "  the  weapons  of  precision," 
used  by  the  advancing  forces  of  science,  on  the 
other.  ^  Now  let  it  be  remembered  that  we  have 
not  here  to  do  with  the  masses  of  mankind,  to 
whom  historical  and  scientific  arguments,  whether 
negative  or  affirmative,  are,  and  probably  must  re- 
main, inaccessible.  We  are  speaking  of  that  stand- 
ing army,  so  to  call  it,  of  more  or  less  instructed 
persons,  who,  on  the  one  side  and  the  other, 
execute   all  the  fighting   on   behalf  of  the  com- 

*  Nineteenth  Century,  July,  1890,  p.  22. 


312  CONCLUSION. 

munity  at  large.  Writing,  then,  of  those  within 
the  palisades  of  the  lists,  and  not  appealing  to 
mere  numbers,  I  demur  entirely  to  the  statement 
of  Professor  Huxley.  I  deny  that  the  weapons  of 
belief  are  antiquated ;  I  pause  even  before  admit- 
ting that  those  of  scientific  men  are  always,  except 
in  their  own  particular  sciences,  weapons  of  pre- 
cision. When  we  decline  the  appeal  to  the  estab- 
lished facts  of  science,  or  to  the  conclusions  up- 
held or  reasonably  sustained  by  human  experience 
through  history,  or  when  we  fall  into  the  trap  laid 
for  us  by  Hume,  and  treat  the  acceptance  of  our 
"  holy  religion  "  as  a  matter  in  no  way  amenable 
to  the  view  of  reason ;  then  we  may  be  justly 
charged  with  the  use  of  weapons  never  worthy, 
and  no  longer  serviceable.  But  until  then,  we  may 
quietly  endeavor  to  proceed  as  rational  beings  upon 
rational  considerations.  If  these  principles  have 
not  uniformly  guided  me  in  the  composition  of 
the  papers  I  am  now  bringing  to  a  close  (on  which 
it  is  not  for  me  to  judge),  at  least  I  can  say 
that  there   has   not  been   in   any   instance,  even 


CONCLUSION.  313 

by  a  hair's-breadth,  an  intentional  deviation  from 
them. 

The  fact,  however,  of  a  strong  and  widespread 
negative  movement  among  important  and  active 
sections  of  our  countrymen  during  the  latter  por- 
tion of  this  century,  is  admitted  ;  and  now  I  propose 
to  offer  some  remarks  upon  its  alleged  or  probable 
causes. 

I  shall  speak,  first,  of  the  detriment  which  religion 
is  supposed  to  have  suffered  through  the  great  and 
wonderful  advance  both  of  science  and  of  rational 
speculation,  mostly  physical,  but  also  critical, 
archaeological,  and  historical. 

Secondly,  of  the  detriment  it  has  suffered  through 
the  exposure  to  the  world  of  erroneous  notions 
about  religion,  which  are  due  to  believers  them- 
selves :  a  detriment  attending,  in  different  manners 
and  degrees,  either  the  retention,  or  even  the 
abandonment,  of  these  opinions.  Such  detriment 
seems  to  me  certain  to  ensue,  when  we  uplift  into 
the  region  of  dogmatic  truth  (for  example)  such 
propositions  as  the  following:    i.  That  the  material 


314  CONCLUSION, 

volume  of  the  Holy  Scriptures,  translated  into  our 
tongue,  with  every  fact  and  sentiment  it  contains, 
must  be  received  under  the  same  (so  to  call  it) 
materialized  conception,  as  that  under  which  Ma- 
hometans are  supposed  to  receive  the  Koran,  and 
held  absolutely  true ;  or,  2,  that  there  is  no  pro- 
gression or  distinction  in  the  inspiration  to  which 
it  is  to  be  referred ;  or,  3,  that  the  Adam  portrayed 
in  Scripture  was  the  exclusive  source  of  the  race ; 
or,  4,  that  he  was  furnished  with  large  intellectual 
development  and  endowment. 

Thirdly,  I  shall  speak  of  the  strength  which  the 
negative  movement  has  in  my  opinion  derived  from 
causes  greatly  and  subtly  effective,  yet  wholly  ex- 
trinsic to  itself;  causes  which  I  take  to  constitute 
its  principal  strength. 

Of  the  first  head  I  might  dispose  very  briefly. 
I  have  enumerated  some  of  the  great  services 
which  science  has  rendered,  and  is  rendering,  to 
religion.  Of  the  damage  it  has  inflicted  I  have 
heard  much ;  but  the  allegations  commonly  appear 
to  me  upon  examination  to  be  found  untrue:  in 


CONCLUSION.  315 

some  cases,  like  that  of  the  first  chapter  of  Genesis, 
to  be  not  only  untrue  but  contradictory  of  the  truth, 
inasmuch  as  science,  when  just  principles  of  inter- 
pretation are  called  in,  is  found  to  have  established 
what  it  has  been  charged  with  destroying. 

The  nearest  semblance,  that  has  attracted  my 
notice,  to  palpable  contradiction  between  modern 
science  and  Holy  Writ  is  upon  the  statement  that 
sin  brought  death  into  the  world,  whereas  we  now 
know  that  death  was  antecedent  to  the  introduc- 
tion of  man,  and  therefore  of  sin.  But  in  Scripture, 
beyond  all  dispute,  the  word  "death"  has  many 
senses.  For  example,  it  means  habitually,  severance 
of  spirit  from  body.  It  means  separation  from  God, 
and  domination  of  body  over  spirit  (Luke  i  :  79 ; 
John  8:51;  Eph.  2:1).  It  means  reunion  with  God, 
and  domination  of  spirit  over  body  (Col.  2  :  20 ; 
3  :  3  ;  2  Tim.  2:11).  As  it  means  the  soul's  disease, 
severance  from  God,  so  also  it  means  the  final  con- 
summation of  that  disease  in  the  second  death. 
These  are  various  senses  of  the  term,  dispersed 
about  the  Bible.     How  do  we  know  that  St.  Paul 


3l6  CONCLUSION. 

used  the  words  in  the  first  of  these,  and  not  in  the 
second  ?  And  if  he  had  used  it  in  the  first  sense, 
and  had  intended  to  declare  that  there  was  no 
physical  death  before  the  sin  of  Adam,  how  much 
would  this  prove  ?  Only  that  the  apostle  was 
ignorant  of  any  pre-Adamite  history  of  the  planet, 
and  that  we  should  have  to  ask  whether  such  igno- 
rance, when  proved,  would  destroy  or  impair  the 
overflowing  proofs  that  he  was  commissioned  of 
God  to  speak,  and  was  taught  of  God  how  to  speak, 
for  the  salvation  of  the  world  ? 

It  remains,  however,  a  vital  portion  of  our  duty,  on 
the  one  hand,  to  estimate  and  to  measure  aright  the 
differences  between  the  Divine  Revelation  in  itself, 
and  the  subjective  conceptions  entertained  and  prop- 
agated concerning  it ;  and  on  the  other  to  inquire 
pretty  strictly  whether  the  professors  of  science  are 
sometimes  apt  to  push  their  legitimate  authority 
beyond  their  own  bounds  into  provinces  where  it  be- 
comes a  usurpation,  and  whether  the  weapons  which 
they  hurl  are  then  always  "weapons  of  precision." 

On  the  first  of  these  two  points,  I  will  give  an 


CONCLUSION.  317 

illustration  of  my  meaning  from  the  latest  writings 
of  the  Achilles  of  the  opposing  army.  In  a  very 
recent  article,  which  deals  chiefly  with  the  Deluge^ 
Mr.  Huxley,  in  a  succinct  but  decided  way,  admin- 
isters capital  punishment  also  to  the  Creation  Story 
of  Genesis.  He  does  not  enter  much  into  particu- 
lars, but  he  says  the  Israelites  were  like  all  other 
men,  curious  to  know  their  origin.  Now,  so  far  as 
the  records  of  the  past  go,  the  cosmological 
curiosity  of  the  ancients  appears  to  have  been  com- 
paratively small.  The  cosmologies  of  Babylon  and 
Egypt  hold  an  utterly  insignificant  place  in  their 
systems  of  knowledge.  The  Greeks,  perhaps  the 
most  inquisitive  of  men,  cared  little  or  nothing  for 
these  things,  through  many  centuries  after  they  had 
felt  the  passion  of  high  poetry  and  of  the  legends 
associated  with  it;  and  when  their  schools  of  phi- 
losophy arose,  they  dealt,  and  this  only  in  outline, 
with  the  origin  of  material  things,  rather  than  of 
men.  There  was  no  nation,  I  believe,  except  the 
Israelites,  whose  cosmology  held  a  classical  place 

*  Nineteenth  Century,  July,  1890,  p.  21. 


3l8  CONCLUSION. 

in  their  memory  and  in  their  devotions.  But  I  am 
perhaps  wrong  in  arguing  the  question.  What  I 
ought  rather  to  point  out  is  that  while  Professor 
Huxley  is  fond,  as  he  well  may  be,  of  claiming  to 
represent  science,  his  dicUini  is  entirely  outside  the 
sciences  he  represents. 

Again,  in  the  same  short  space  he  proceeds  to 
lay  it  down  that  an  opinion  given  by  Dr.  Riehm 
on  the  subject  of  the  seven  Mosaic  days  (/.  e.^  that 
they  are  natural  days)  should  be  final.  We  claim, 
however,  to  be,  if  not  Freethinkers,  yet  free  thinkers. 
Why  are  we  to  renounce  the  faculty  of  discourse,  to 
square  our  minds  to  those  of  Dr.  Riehm,  to  let  him 
do  the  thinking  for  us,  and  to  accept  his  words  as' 
"final"?  Simply  because  Mr.  Huxley  has  said  so. 
What  right  has  Professor  Huxley  to  close  this  ques- 
tion ?  For  the  question  whether  the  Creation  Story 
of  Genesis  describes  solar  days  or  not,  is  no  more 
a  scientific  question  than  whether  Parliament  should 
or  should  not  meet  in  November,  or  whether  Shake- 
speare wrote  or  did  not  write  the  whole  of  "  Henry 
the  Eighth." 


CONCLUSION.  319 

But  I  have  now  to  ask  whether  the  weapons 
used  by  this  most  distinguished  scientist  are 
always  "weapons  of  precision."  On  scientific 
grounds  he  condemns,  as  we  have  seen,  the  nar- 
rative of  the  Deluge,  and  pronounces  it  to  be 
fabulous.  One  of  his  reasons  is  this.  The  Mosaic 
account  assigns  a  period  of  one  hundred  and  fifty 
days  (the  Tablets  give  only  seven)  for  the  subsi- 
dence of  the  waters.  Against  this  statement  Mr. 
Huxley  advances  a  dictum,  of  which  the  subject- 
matter  is  unquestionably  scientific.  He  gives  the 
length  of  the  Mesopotamian  plain  ^  at  three  to  four 
hundred  miles,  and  the  elevation  of  the  higher  end 
at  five  to  six  hundred  feet.  Had  this  plain  been  so 
covered  with  water,  says  Mr.  Huxley,  a  "  furious 
torrent"  would  have  rushed  downwards,  and,  in- 
stead of  a  hundred  and  fifty  days,  the  plain  gen- 
erally (this  word  no  doubt  is  meant  to  except 
particular  hollows  of  the  ground)  would  have  been 
left  bare  in  a  very  few  hours. 

Let  us  try  this  question  a  little  more  nearly.     If 

^  Nineteenth  Century,  July,  1890,  p.  15. 


320  CONCLUSION, 

the  length  of  the  plain  be  350  miles,  and  the  fall  525 
feet,  we  have  a  descent  of  one  foot  and  a  half  per 
mile ;  and  this  descent,  says  the  Professor,  would 
cause  a  furious  torrent,  such  as  would  clear  the  plain 
in  a  very  few  hours.  Let  us  assume  twenty  miles  an 
hour  as  the  rate  of  the  "  furious  torrent ;  "  on  which 
assumption  the  plain  would  be  bare  in  seventeen 
and  a  half  hours.  I  take  these  rates  and  figures  so 
as  to  translate  approximately  into  definite  quan- 
tities Mr.  Huxley's  more  general  expressions. 

One  foot  and  a  half  per  mile  represents  a  gradi- 
ent of  ^Vrr.  I  have  sought  information  on  this 
subject  from  an  engineer,  who  is  in  charge  of  a 
portion  of  one  of  our  rivers.  I  understand  from 
him  that  a  fall  of  one  in  three  thousand  four  hun- 
dred and  twenty  would  probably  produce  a  current 
of  about  two  miles  an  hour.  It  may  require  all 
Professor  Huxley's  resources  to  show  that  a  cur- 
rent of  two  miles  an  hour  is  a  "furious  torrent;" 
or  that  to  represent  as  a  furious  torrent  what  is  in 
truth  an  extremely  slow  stream  is  to  use  a  "  weapon 
of  precision." 


CONCLUSION,  321 

My  informant,  indeed,  adds  that  each  case  has 
modifying  circumstances  of  its  own,  and  must  be 
judged  by  itself;  but  he  likewise  tells  me  that  if, 
instead  of  taking  an  ordinary  English  river,  we 
remove  the  banks,  and  suppose  the  stream  indefi- 
nitely widened,  the  fall  remaining  the  same,  the 
rate  of  the  current  would  be  not  increased  but 
slackened.  Thus  we  seem  to  get  farther  and  far- 
ther from  the  "weapons  of  precision."  And  it 
seems  just  possible  that,  after  all,  these  weapons 
may,  like  our  monster  guns,  sometimes  damage 
those  who  handle  them,  or  may  fail  to  batter  down 
so  soon  as  is  expected  the  undoubtedly  ancient 
walls  of  the  fortress  of  belief^ 

The  case  to  which  I  have  last  referred  is  one  of 
elementary  hydraulics.  The  obligation  to  be  pre- 
cise may  be  thought  to  rise  with  the  elevation  of 
the  subject.  If  we  may  not  ask  from  the  scientific 
man  that  when  he  touches  questions  of  the  inner- 

1  It  is  not  without  interest  to  remark  that,  on  the  data  before  us, 
the  time  required  for  clearing  the  plain  would  be  about  162  hours,  or 
nearly  seven  days,  the  actual  time  mentioned  in  the  Babylonian 
account. 

21 


322  CONCLUSION. 

most  feelings  of  believers,  and  of  the  highest  des- 
tinies of  man,  he  should  be  reverent,  yet  surely  we 
are  entitled  to  require  of  him  that  he  should  be 
circumspect;  that  he  should  take  reasonable  care 
to  include  in  his  survey  of  a  case  all  elements 
which  are  obviously  essential  to  a  right  judgment 
upon  it. 

In  another  recent  article,  ^  Mr.  Huxley  has 
touched  very  lofty  ground  indeed.  He  selects  as 
a  crucial  instance  for  the  trial  of  the  Gospels,  and 
with  them  of  the  character  of  our  Lord,  the  mira- 
cle which  happened  in  the  country  of  the  Ger- 
gesenes,  or  Gadarenes.  It  is  narrated,  with  certain 
variations,  by  three  Evangelists  ;  the  essential  point 
being  that  evil  spirits,  cast  out  from  the  body  of  a 
demoniac,  are  permitted  to  enter  into  a  herd  of 
swine,  and  that  the  animals  rush  furiously  into 
the  sea.  Mr.  Huxley,  as  a  physiologist,  disbelieves 
in  demoniacal  possession,  and  that  is  the  point  that 
has  commonly  attracted  the  chief  share  of  atten- 
tion in  connection  with  this  miracle.    Such  a  physio- 

1  Nineteenth  Century,  February,  1889,  pp.  171,  172. 


CONCLUSION.  323 

logical  judgment  it  is  not  for  me  to  discuss.  But 
he  also  very  properly  touches  the  question  of  the 
injury  inflicted  by  the  destruction  of  the  swine, 
which  was  due  to  our  Lord's  permission.  Mr. 
Huxley  observes  that  the  EvangeUst  has  no  "ink- 
ling of  the  legal  and  moral  difficulties  of  the  case," 
and  adds,  the  devils  entered  into  the  swine  "  to  the 
great  loss  and  damage  of  the  innocent  Gerasene  or 
Gadarcne  pig-owners."  Further,  "everything  that 
I  know  of  law  and  justice  convinces  me  that  the 
wanton  destruction  of  other  people's  property  is  a 
misdemeanor  of  evil  example." 

So  then,  after  eighteen  centuries  of  worship 
offered  to  our  Lord  by  the  most  cultivated,  the 
most  developed,  and  the  most  progressive,  portion 
of  the  human  race,  it  has  been  reserved  to  a 
scientific  inquirer  to  discover  that  he  was  no  bet- 
ter than  a  law-breaker  and  an  evil-doer.  It  is 
sometimes  said  that  the  greatest  discoveries  are 
the  most  simple.  And  this,  if  really  a  discovery, 
is  the  simplest  of  them  all.  So  simple  that  he 
who  runs  may  read,  for  it  lies  on  the  very  surface 


324  CONCLUSION. 

of  the  page.  The  ordinary  reader  can  only  put  the 
wondering  question,  How,  in  such  a  matter,  came 
the  honors  of  originality  to  be  reserved  to  our 
time  and  to  Professor  Huxley? 

Simple  as  it  has  been  from  his  point  of  view,  the 
case  (Matt.  8  :  30;  Mark  5:2;  Luke  8:31)  is  to 
a  reflective  mind  a  very  peculiar  one.  It  offers 
the  only  occasion  on  which  our  Lord  exercised, 
or  co-operated  in  the  exercise  of,  preternatural 
power  for  the  destruction  of  life. 

It  is  observable  that  in  certain  instances,  such  as 
that  of  the  fig-tree,  and  of  the  ass  with  her  colt,  he 
seems  to  assert  himself  as  the  universal  owner. 
He  is  the  Lord  to  kill,  as  well  as  to  make  alive, 
according  to  his  wisdom.  But  this  consideration, 
to  whatever  conclusion  it  might  lead,  is  of  what 
may  be  termed  an  esoteric  nature,  and  is  hardly 
suited  to  an  argument  against  the  negative  school, 
who  are  plainly  entitled  to  raise  the  question  of 
the  swine  as  it  affects  the  rights  of  property.  Why, 
then,  does  our  Lord  in  this  instance  see  cause 
to  vary   from   the   philanthropic    and    beneficent 


CONCLUSION.  325 

tendencies,  which  usually  mark  his  miraculous 
agency  ?  It  has  been  observed  that  the  entrance 
into  the  swine  may  have  been  permitted,  in  order 
to  certify  the  man  or  men  relieved  of  the  reality 
of  the  great  and  hardly  credible  deliverance  vouch- 
safed to  him.  And  again,  that  the  willing  de- 
parture of  the  demons  may  have  spared  the  victim 
or  victims  from  the  tortures  which  it  is  natural 
to  suppose  would  have  attended  their  violent 
ejection.  Yet  something  more  seems  to  be  de- 
sirable in  order  to  meet  the  question  that  has  just 
been  raised.  I  find  the  answer  to  it  in  the  reason- 
able, and  (as  it  seems  to  me)  almost  necessary  sup- 
position, that  the  possession  of  the  swine  was 
unlawful,  and,  therefore,  was  justly  punishable  by 
the  ensuing  loss. 

The  scene  is  described  by  different  Evangelists 
in  different  terms.  It  is  the  country  of  the  Gerge- 
senes,  or  the  country  of  the  Gadarenes.  The  dis- 
tinction is  immaterial  to  the  present  purpose.  It 
was  apparently  part  of  the  land  of  the  Girgashites 
(Deut.  7:1),  one  of  the  seven  Canaanitish  nations, 


326  CONCLUSION, 

and  was  subject,  therefore,  as  a  matter  of  religious 
obligation,  to  the  Mosaic  law.  Now  that  law  con- 
tained a  prohibition  to  use  various  meats,  among 
which  pork  was  included.  But  in  the  case  of  swine 
the  law  went  farther  than  in  other  cases,  and  it  was 
forbidden  even  to  touch  the  carcass  (Lev.  11:7,  8). 
Such  a  prohibition  of  course  precluded  all  use 
whatever  of  the  animals  when  dead ;  and  it  was 
only  for  use  when  dead  that  there  could  be  any 
object  in  keeping  them  at  all.  Nor  was  this  pro- 
hibition merely  ceremonial.  It  was  immediately 
related  to  the  health  of  the  people,  as  the  use  of 
pork  (I  am  informed)  produces  the  disease  called 
trichinosis,  and  I  understand  that  the  veto  is  down 
to  this  day  regarded  by  well-informed  Jews  as  of  a 
serious  importance,  and  is  directly  connected  with 
a  high  sanitary  condition. 

It  may  be  that  the  deeper  counsels  of  Providence 
are  more  implicated  in  this  prohibition,  than  even 
a  less  superficial  reader  of  the  Gospels  than  Pro- 
fessor Huxley  might  at  first  sight  suppose.  That 
calling  of  the  Hebrew  people,  which  is  set  before 


CONCLUSION.  327 

us  in  the  Old  Testament,  demanded  in  them  above 
and  beyond  all  other  qualities  the  quality  of  per- 
sistence. It  may  be  that  this  purpose  required  the 
constitution  of  the  race,  in  body  as  well  as  in  many 
points  of  character,  to  be  raised  to  a  point  unusually 
high.  We  know  that  man  is  a  compound  being,  and 
we  know  that  the  Mosaic  code  took  cognizance  of 
bodily  health  to  an  extent  quite  unknown  in  other 
schemes  of  legislation.  In  the  Book  of  Exodus  (i : 
19),  reference  was  made  to  the  superior  formation  of 
the  Hebrew  women  for  the  great  office  of  a  mother, 
and  I  am  informed  that  the  modern  researches  of 
anatomists,  supporting  the  text,  refer  the  fact  to  a 
physical  cause.  I  have  learned  enough  from  some 
high  medical  authorities  to  be  warranted  in  saying 
that  the  sanitary  qualities  .  of  the  Jewish  race,  even 
in  our  own  time,  and  their  superior  longevity, 
appear  in  no  small  manner  to  be  due  to  the  strict 
observance  of  the  Mosaic  law.  These  remarks 
may  be  justifiable  in  connection  with  what  I  have 
said  of  the  description  of  authority,  which  they 
attach   to   a   particular   prohibition.     Yet   for   the 


328  CONCLUSION. 

immediate  purpose  of  the  argument  it  may  suffice 
to  have  pointed  out  the  illegality  of  keeping 
swine. 

Mr.  Huxley,  exercising  his  rapid  judgment  on 
the  text,  does  not  appear  to  have  encumbered 
himself  with  the  labor  of  inquiring  what  anybody 
else  had  known  or  said  about  it.  He  has  thus 
missed  a  point  which  might  have  been  set  up  in 
support  of  his  accusation  against  our  Lord.  Some 
commentators  have  alleged  the  authority  of 
Josephus  for  stating  that  Gadara  was  a  city  of 
Greeks  rather  than  of  Jews,  from  whence  it  might 
be  inferred  that  to  keep  swine  was  innocent  and 
lawful.  This  is  not  quite  the  place  for  a  critical 
examination  of  the  matter ;  but  I  have  examined  it, 
and  have  satisfied  myself  that  Josephus  gives  no 
reason  whatever  to  suppose  that  the  population  of 
Gadara,  still  less  (if  less  may  be)  the  population 
of  the  neighborhood,  and  least  of  all  the  swine- 
herding    or    lower  ^    portion   of    that   population, 

1  It  is  clear  that  such  people  could  not  be  the  owners  of  2,000 
swine.  But  (i)  this  is  stated  in  St.  Mark  only;  (2)  it  is  stated  in  a 
parenthesis,  whereas  it  would  naturally  appear  in  the  direct  narrative; 


CONCLUSION.  329 

were  other  than  Hebrews,  bound  by  the  Mosaic 
law.  Now,  this  being  the  case,  the  punishment 
inflicted  upon  the  owners  of  the  swine  by  the  per- 
mission of  our  Lord,  did  not  constitute  a  breach, 
but  rather  a  vindication  of  the  law ;  as  a  law 
would  be  vindicated  if  casks  of  smuggled  spirits 
were  caught  and  broken  open  after  landing,  and 
their  contents  wasted  on  the  ground.^ 

Surely,  if  these  were  only  possibilities,  instead  of 
rather  cogent  likelihoods,  they  should  have  been  ex- 
amined and  weighed  before  pronouncing  sentence 
on  One  who,  apart  from  all  other  claims,  must  be 
supposed  to  have  had  some  considerable  reason 
for  deviating  from  his  usually  beneficent  and  gentle 
methods.  And,  again,  such  hand-over-head  reason- 
ing is  hard  to  reconcile  either  with  the  judicial 
temper,  or  with  the  claim,  nay,  the  exclusive  claim, 
to  the  honor  of  using  "  weapons  of  precision." 

There  is  yet  another  point  of  great  importance,  in 

(3)  so  large  a  number  suggests  the  error  of  a  copyist,  or  very  possibly 
a  marginal  gloss. 

1  For  the  further  elucidation  of  this  important  case,  I  have  added  a 
note  at  the  end. 


330  CONCLUSION. 

regard  to  which  I  desire  to  challenge  the  methods 
pursued  by  some  critics  of  the  Holy  Scriptures;  and 
I  cannot  do  better  than  again  proceed  on  the  re- 
cent article  of  Professor  Huxley.  He  finds,  on  the 
one  hand,  a  vast  mass  of  diversified  tradition,  which 
agrees  in  reporting  a  flood.  He  finds  that,  as  we 
draw  near  to  that  central  seat  of  civilization  in 
Chaldaea,  from  which  Abraham  probably  carried 
the  Hebrew  narrative,  it  unfolds  largely  into  detail, 
and  that  the  tradition,  which  thus  emigrated,  is  sup- 
ported in  many  very  remarkable  particulars  by  the 
history  which  has  been  recorded  in  the  Tablets. 
Finding,  however,  in  the  Mosaic  story,  various 
statements  which  he  deems  to  be  irreconcilable 
with  natural  laws,  he  protests,  not  against  those 
particular  statements,  but  against  the  entire  rela- 
tion ;  and  he  casts  aside  without  more  ado,  not 
only  the  whole  tale  as  it  is  given  in  Genesis,  but 
the  large  mass  of  collateral  testimony,  from  eveiy 
quarter  of  the  globe,  which  supports  it.  Is  this  a 
scientific,  is  it  a  philosophical,  is  it  altogether  a 
rational,  method  of  proceeding  ? 


CONCLUSION.  Ill 

Errors,  and  even  great  errors,  may  creep  into  a 
true  narration.  This  is  a  case  where  the  tale  had, 
according  to  all  appearances,  been  carried  orally 
for  ages,  perhaps  for  very  many  ages,  before  the 
race  that  have  transmitted  it  to  us  had  the  means 
of  giving  it  a  written  form.  Was  it  not  likely  that 
some,  perhaps  even  that  much,  variation  of  par- 
ticulars would  creep  in  ?  Could  they  be  shut  out 
except  by  miracle,  and  has  the  Christian  Church 
ever  taught  us  to  believe  in  such  a  miracle?  Is  it 
not  the  fact  that,  as  between  the  Chaldee  and  the 
Hebrew  reports,  the  essence  of  the  story  remains 
in  absolute  integrity  ?  A  divine  warning,  a  woful 
prevalence  of  sin,  a  terrible  inundation  or  deluge  as 
a  punishment,  the  rescue  of  a  small  and  righteous 
remnant, — not  only  do  these  things  remain,  but 
traditions  supporting  them  in  several  or  in  all 
points  have  descended  to  us  independently  through 
a  hundred  channels;  and  we  are  now  asked  to  be- 
lieve that,  in  each  of  these,  imagination,  and  imagi- 
nation only,  has  been  at  work,  and  that  in  each  of 
them  it  has  worked  with  an  essentially  (though  not 


332  CONCLUSION, 

circumstantially)  identical  result.  May  not  this  be 
to  substitute  for  a  great  physical  a  greater  moral 
miracle,  and  are  we  not  even  in  some  danger  of 
exchanging  the  unaccountable  for  the  absurd? 

My  conclusion,  then,  upon  this  part  of  the  sub- 
ject, be  it  worth  much  or  little,  is  threefold.  I  am 
grateful  to  science,  both  physical  and  historical,  for 
the  noble  services  it  has  rendered  to  belief  by  the 
establishment  of  truths,  or  by  the  rational  accept- 
ance of  propositions,  in  its  own  domain.  I  feel  that 
science  is  not  responsible  for  any  errors  of  scien- 
tists, either  in  the  misconstruction  of  the  Bible  or 
in  offenses  which  their  share  of  human  frailty  may 
have  led  them  occasionally  to  commit  against  the 
known  laws  of  rational  discussion.  And,  lastly,  I 
am  grateful  both  to  science  and  to  scientists  for 
having  assisted,  or  for  having  compelled,  those 
who  believe  to  correct  errors  which,  in  the  wan- 
tonness of  power,  they  may  too  long  have  cher- 
ished, and  to*  submit  all  their  claims  to  free  and 
critical  investigation. 

The  retreat  from  an  untenable  to  a  tenable  posi- 


CONCLUSION.  333 

tion  is  in  itself  an  unmixed  good.  We  feel  that 
we  have  redressed  a  wrong  which  had  been  done  to 
Truth ;  and  we  breathe  the  more  freely  for  the  act. 
Still  there  is  a  retribution  in  store  for  error ;  and, 
given  all  the  conditions  of  human  feeling,  thought, 
and  action,  this  recession  is  an  operation  of  invari- 
able danger,  and,  for  the  time  at  least,  of  mixed 
result.  Happy  they  who  accurately  know,  and  who 
exactly  realize  to  themselves,  in  the  practical  part 
of  their  being,  what  it  is  that  they  ought  to  abandon 
and  what  to  retain,  nor  only  to  retain,  but  to  uphold 
with  a  determination  enhanced  in  proportion  to  the 
difficulties  of  the  day."  But  in  the  minds  of  many, 
perhaps  of  the  greater  part,  the  dominant  sense,  at 
least  for  a  time,  will  be  that  they  have  passed  from 
a  ground  old  and  familiar  to  one  new  and  strange ; 
that  they  have  parted  with  something,  they  do  not 
quite  know  how  much ;  that  if  they  have  been 
wrong  once,  they  may,  perhaps,  be  wrong  again. 
And  then  it  is  so  much  easier  to  believe  in  a 
volume,  which  the  hand  could  grasp,  than  to  hold 
fast  the  mental  conception  of  a  Revelation  con- 


334  CONCLUSION. 

veyed  in  that  volume.  True,  such  a  conception  of 
God  in  the  Bible,  which  may  be,  but  ought  not  to 
have  been,  a  new  one,  is  strictly  and  solidly  analo- 
gous to  the  familiar,  and  equally  indispensable, 
conceptions  of  God  in  Nature,  God  in  Providence, 
God  in  the  Christian  Church.  But  these  we  had 
from  our  cradles ;  they  were  thoroughly  congenial 
through  use.  To  apply  the  same  rule  to  the  Bible 
is  really  to  integrate,  rather  than  to  disintegrate,  the 
idea  of  our  knowledge  of  God.  But  there  is  some- 
thing like  the  discomfort  of  a  new  habiliment  to  be 
got  over ;  and  there  are  the  ready,  sometimes  per- 
haps the  too  ready,  taunts  of  the  adversary  to  be 
endured. 

I  will  not  dwell  at  large  upon  other  difficulties 
springing  from  the  errors  or  the  incaution  of  be- 
lievers ;  but  they  are  grave  in  their  nature.  When- 
ever, under  the  idea  of  magnifying  the  grace  or 
favor  of  God,  we  derogate  from  his  immutable 
righteousness  and  justice;  and  whenever,  in  exalt- 
ing the  unspeakable  mercy  of  his  pardon,  we 
unhinge  its  inseparable  alliance  with  a  profound  and 


CONCLUSION.  335 

penetrating  moral  work  in  the  creature  pardoned, — 
then  we  draw  down  dangers  upon  the  Christian 
system  greater  far  than  can  ever  be  entailed  upon 
it  by  its  enemies.  But  there  may  be  worse  still 
than  this.  Worse  there  will  be,  if  the  believer  in 
Christ  holds  the  doctrine  without  giving  effect  to  it 
in  his  life ;  and,  worst  of  all,  if  while  he  holds  it  he 
not  only  is  betrayed  into  the  ordinary  weaknesses 
or  excesses  of  human  nature,  but  forgets  also,  and 
derides  or  disregards,  those  primal  sanctions  of 
natural  morality,  which  vice  itself  is  not  always 
hardened  enough  to  discard.  The  constitution  of 
the  family,  the  ties  between  its  members,  the  nature 
of  the  woman  and  of  the  man,  and  the  relation  of 
each  one  of  them  to  himself,  to  that  self,  which  is 
entrusted  by  God  to  every  one  of  us  to  study  and 
to  revere,  as  well  as  to  cleanse,  to  cherish,  and  to 
sanctify, — all  these  are  regulated  by  laws  the  oldest, 
holiest,  and  most  profound  of  all.  Progress  may 
be  traced  and  tested  by  its  regard  for  these  sacro- 
sanct, though  unwritten,  ordinances.  According  as 
such  regard  is  paid  or  not  paid,  we  shall  know 


336  CONCLUSION. 

whether  such  progress  be  a  reality  or  an  im- 
posture; and  Christianity  itself  would  lose  all  its 
titles  were  it  capable  of  an  attempt  to  disturb 
them. 

In  the  class  of  difficulties  thus  roughly  suggested 
has  been,  as  I  believe,  not,  indeed,  a  legitimate,  but 
a  powerfully  operative,  cause  for  the  increase  of 
skepticism. 

But  the  gravest  portion  of  the  case  remains. 
Negation  is  in  part,  and  it  professes  and  believes 
itself  to  be  altogether,  an  affair  of  the  intellect.  It 
proclaims,  for  example,  that  the  reason  why  un- 
belief has  (at  the  moment)  so  much  advanced,  is 
that  dogmas  like  those  of  the  Trinity,  the  Incarna- 
tion, the  Sacraments,  and  the  future  judgment,  have 
become  insufferable  to  the  cultivated  human  un- 
derstanding. The  conviction  which  possesses  my 
mind;  and  which  I  may  find  it  difficult  to  express 
in  an  unexceptionable  manner,  is  that  the  main 
operative  cause,  which  has  stimulated  the  growth 
of  modern  negation,  is  not  intellectual,  but  moral  ; 
and  is  to  be  found  in  the  increased  and  incieas- 


CONCLUSION.  337 

ing  dominion  of  the  things  seen  over  the  things 
unseen.^ 

Such  a  proposition  may  at  first  sight  appear  to 
carry  an  odious  meaning,  pharisaical  in  the  worst 
sense  of  the  word;  a  meaning  which  would  provoke, 
and  might  justify,  an  angry  reply.  It  might  be 
interpreted  as  implying  that  the  elevation  of  moral 
character  in  individuals  varied  with  and  according 
to  the  amount  of  their  dogmatic  belief;  a  proposi- 
tion which  in  my  view  is  untrue,  offensive,  and  even 
dbsurd.  Had  I  ever  been  inclined  to  such  a  con- 
ception, the  experience  of  my  life  would  long  ago 
have  undeceived  me.  My  meaning  is  a  very  differ- 
ent one.  I  speak  of  that  which  touches  not  this 
or  that  man  only,  but  us  all.  We  have  altered  the 
standard  of  wants ;  we  have  multiplied  the  demands 
of  appetite;  we  have  established  a  new  state  of 
social  tradition,  of  that  tradition  which  forms  and 

1  In  a  work  of  great  ability  just  issued,  and  termed  "  Scientific  The- 
ology," Mr.  Barber,  a  civil  engineer,  treats  (Chap.  III.,  p.  41)  the 
question,  Why  does  not  religion  reach  the  masses?  His  conclusion  is 
stated  thus  :  "  The  weak  point  is  clearly  the  loss  of  spiritual  motive, 
and  increased  strength  of  natural  motives  as  springs  of  action  and 
thought." 

22 


338  CONCLUSION, 

guides  us,  apart  from  and  antecedently  to  thought 
or  choice  of  our  own.  We  have  created  a  new 
atmosphere,  which  we  breathe  into  ourselves,  and 
by  breathing  which  our  composition  is  modified 
unawares,  according  to  the  ingredients  which  that 
atmosphere  contains.  I  do  not  say  that  we  are  the 
creatures  of  what  surrounds  us,  for  we  have  power 
to  reflect  upon  and  to  control  it.  Yet,  reflection 
and  control  are  exercised  but  little,  in  comparison 
with  the  need  for  them ;  and,  in  the  absence  of 
such  exercise,  it  is  the  surrounding  atmosphere,  it 
is  the  ordinary  standard,  accepted,  and  to  a  great 
extent  necessarily  accepted,  without  examination, 
that  both  supplies  the  stock  wherewith  we  indi- 
vidually begin  the  great  adventure  of  the  world,  and 
that  guides  our  life,  except  in  the  rare  cases  where 
depravity  on  one  side,  or  Christian  heroism  on  the 
other,  causes  us  to  adopt  a  separate  standard  for 
ourselves.  Where  both  range  only  within  the  zone 
marked  out  by  fashionable  opinion,  it  is  sadly  easy 
to  point  out  men  of  high  virtue  with  little  creed, 
and  men  of  low  virtue  with  much  creed,  in  the  dis- 


CONCLUSION.  339 

cipline  and  conduct  of  their  personal  lives  respec- 
tively. And,  in  the  region  of  opinion,  it  often 
seems  as  if  liberty  and  justice  among  men  fared 
quite  as  well  with  the  heterodox,  as  with  the 
orthodox. 

A  large  part  of  these  grave  and  even  terrible 
anomalies  is  no  doubt  due  to  the  fact,  that  to  each 
of  us  personally  our  creed  has  come,  not  with  the 
throes  of  struggle,  sacrifice,  and  strong  conviction, 
but  rather,  like  most  of  what  we  hold — an  easy 
tenure  ! — by  descent,  through  others,  not  from  our- 
selves; as  matter  of  course,  not  of  choice  and 
effort;  so  that  it  sits  upon  us  like  an  outward 
badge,  rather  than  pervades  us  as  a  principle  and 
a  power. 

But,  on  the  other  hand,  how  true  it  will  be  found 
that  the  sovereign  tradition  which  has  filled  the  air 
is  the  Christian  tradition.  This  it  is,  which  has 
made  possible  what  without  it  would  have  been 
wholly  beyond  reach.  This  it  is,  which  carries 
noiselessly  into  many  minds  and  characters  those 
opinions  on  behalf  of  virtue,  of  self-denial,  and  of 


340  CONCLUSION. 

philanthropy,  together  with  the  power  of  acting 
upon  them,  which  are  often  found  so  honorably  to 
distinguish  creedless  men.  Just  as  many,  who  do 
not  reject  Christianity,  know  not  why  or  how  they 
came  to  hold  it,  so  many,  who  have  abjured  Chris-  ^ 
tianity,  know  not  that,  in  the  best  of  their  thought, 
their  nature,  and  their  practice,  they  are  appropriating 
its  fruits.  What  is  the  modern  word  "  altruism  "  ? 
As  to  its  meaning,  it  is  simply  the  second  great 
commandment  of  the  Christian  law,  which  was 
"  like  unto  the  first."  As  to  its  form,  it  is  merely  a 
disguise  which  has  been  put  upon  a  borrowed  idea, 
so  that  it  often  fails  to  be  traced  to  its  true  original. 
And  this  not  by  a  conscious,  but,  if  the  phrase  may 
be  pardoned,  by  an  unconscious  fraud.  We  find 
ourselves  in  possession  of  the  code  of  Christian 
ethics,  which  has  gradually  pervaded  life,  institu- 
tions, manners,  and  has  become  so  blended  with 
our  ordinary  life  that  the  memory  of  its  divine 
origin  has  faded  away,  as  though  it  were  like  the 
title-deed  of  some  inheritance  which  we  hold  by 
unquestioned  use.     If  we  wish  to  know  what  the 


CONCLUSION,  341 

Christian  tradition  has  done  for  us,  we  must  exam- 
ine the  moral  standard  of  nations  who  have  differed 
from  us  mainly  in  not  having  it.  For  example,  we 
must  look  to  the  Greeks  of  the  fifth  century  before 
Christ,  or  the  Romans  at  and  after  the  period  of 
the  Advent,  whose  moral  degradation  was  not  less 
conspicuous  than  the  intellectual  splendor  of  the 
one,  or  the  constructive  political  genius  of  the 
other. 

My  twofold  proposition  is  that  we  have  before 
us  an  increased  power  of  things  seen,  and  that  this 
increased  power  implies  a  diminishing  hold  upon 
us  of  things  unseen.  The  question  is  no  new  one. 
Throughout  the  history  of  mankind,  the  invisible, 
and  the  future  which  is  part  of  the  invisible,  have 
been  in  standing  competition  with  what  may  be 
termed  the  things  of  this  world. 

"  Two  magnets,  heaven-  and  earth,  allure  to  bliss  ; 
The  larger  loadstone  that,  the  nearer  this  ; 
The  weak  attraction  of  the  greater  fails, 
We  nod  awhile,  but  neighborhood  prevails."* 

There  has  never  been  a  time  in  human  history  to 

iDryden.  "  Hind  and  Panther,"  Part  III 


342  CONCLUSION. 

compare  with  the  last  half-century  in  two  vital  re- 
spects :  the  multiplication  of  wealth,  and  the  multi- 
plication of  the  enjoyments  which  wealth  procures  ; 
two  things  separate,  yet  concurrent,  and  morally 
allied.  To  take  a  familiar  example :  men  (and  the 
commodities  they  depend  on)  now  travel  at  (say) 
one- fourth  of  the  former  cost,  just  when  they  have 
also  an  enlargement  of  their  means  to  bear  the 
cost  of  traveling.  True,  this  pervading  change  has 
gone,  to  an  immense  extent,  towards  the  cure  of 
actual  want,  and  towards  extending  the  sphere  of 
that  sufficiency,  that  modest  and  humble  comfort, 
which  do  not  at  all  come  within  the  scope  of  the 
present  argument.  But  it  has  also  extended  largely 
to  the  spheres  of  leisure  and  of  comparative  afflu- 
ence ;  and  in  those  spheres  it  is  generally  true  that 
the  apparatus  of  enjoyment  has  been  immensely 
developed  in  small  things  and  great,  that  wants 
and  appetites  have  grown  along  with  it,  and  that 
if  "  the  world  was  too  much  with  us"  when  Words- 
worth wrote  his  noble  sonnet,  it  is  more  with  us 
now  than  it  was  then.     Obviously,  almost  mathe- 


CONCLUSION.  343 

matically,  the  increased  powers  of  worldly  attrac- 
tion disturb  the  balance  of  our  condition,  unless 
and  until  they  are  compensated  by  increased  powers 
of  unworldly  attraction  and  elevation.  Whence  are 
such  compensating  powers  to  be  had  ?  I  am  afraid 
we  can  hardly  say  that,  in  the  spheres  now  under 
view,  there  has  been  such  a  growth  in  unworldly 
motives  and  ideas,  as  to  countervail  the  augmented 
strength  of  worldly  attachment.  And  I  apprehend 
that,  if  the  unseen  world  and  the  ideas  belonging 
to  it  operate  upon  us  with  a  proportionately  dimin- 
ished force,  it  follows,  almost  as  a  matter  of  course, 
that  creeds,  which  belong  to  that  circle  of  unseen 
associations,  will  be  more  dimly  and  therefore  more 
feebly  appreciated.  Materialism  as  a  formulated 
system  is  probably  not  upon  the  increase.  Those 
who  think,  as  I  am  compelled  to  think,  about 
the  intellectual  caliber  and  capabihties  of  such  a 
system,  will  hardly  include  such  a  growth  among 
the  objects  of  their  apprehension.  But  the  power 
of  a  silent,  unavowed,  unconscious  materialism  is 
a  very  different   matter.     I    think   Professor   Max 


344  CONCLUSION, 

Miiller  has  said  that  without  language  there  can- 
not be  thought.  And  this,  I  suppose,  is  true  of 
all  organized  and  conscious  thought.  But  there 
are  in  human  nature  a  multitude  of  undeveloped 
(so  to  speak)  embryonic  forces,  of  impressions  re- 
ceived from  without,  and  finding  a  congenial  soil 
within,  which  never  ripen  to  maturity,  or  make 
their  way  into  articulate  speech,  or  obtain  a  defined 
place  in  our  consciousness. 

My  belief  is  that  at  this  moment  these  unspoken 
and  untested  movements,  not  so  much  of  mind  as 
of  appetite,  or,  to  use  a  milder  word,  propensity, 
pressing  upon  mind,  these  not  thoughts,  but  rudi- 
ments of  thought,  are  at  work  among  us,  and  with- 
in us ;  and  that,  were  they  translated  or  expanded 
into  words,  their  sense  would  be  no  more  nor  less 
than  the  old  vulgar  sense  of  those,  who  in  every 
age  have  held  that,  after  all,  this  world  is  the  only 
world  we  securely  know ;  and  that  the  only  labor 
that  is  worth  laboring,  the  only  care  worth  caring, 
the  only  joy  worth  enjoying,  are  the  labor,  the  care, 
the  joy,  that  begin  and  end  with  it.     What  can  be 


CONCLUSION.  345 

more  natural  (in  the  lower  sense  of  nature)  than 
that  among  those  on  whom  this  world  really  smiles, 
together  with  the  increasing  gravitation  towards  a 
terrestrial  center,  too  often  a  creeping  palsy  should 
silently  come  over  the  inward  life  ?  And  how  easy 
it  is  to  understand  that,  when  such  a  palsy  has  set 
in,  a  new  and  less  ungenial  color  is  imparted  to 
whatever  undermines  the  written  Word,  or  the 
great  Christian  tradition,  or  in  whatever  other  way 
repels,  or  blinds  and  deadens,  the  sense  of  the 
presence  of  God,  and  silences  the  reproaches  of 
the  voice  within.  So  that  it  is  not  either  real  or 
pretended  science,  nor  is  it  even  the  errors  and 
excesses  of  believers,  illegitimately  charged  upon 
behef,  that  form  the  root  of  the  mischief  It  is 
the  increased  force  within  us  of  all  which  is  sen- 
suous and  worldly  that  furnishes  every  skeptical 
argument,  good,  bad,  or  indifferent,  with  an  unseen 
ally,  and  that  recruits  many  and  many  a  disciple 
of  the  negative  teaching.  He  indeed  dreams  that 
by  the  free  admission  of  doubt  he  is  paying  homage 
to  truth,  when  in  reality  he  is  only  pampering  the 


34^  CONCLUSION. 

inferior  life ;  for  he  allows  fresh  coadjutors,  with 
unexamined  credentials,  to  enter  and  to  reinforce 
its  already  overweening  power.  Ideas  in  them- 
selves weak  are  backed  by  propension,  which  is 
ever  strong.  A  latent  conspiracy  is  established, 
and  two  knights  ride  forth  together  to  the  war, 
one  of  them  fairly  exhibiting  his  countenance,  but 
the  other  with  his  visor  down. 

And  the  chain  of  cause  and  consequence  is  some- 
thing like  this.  The  Christian  Creed  generates  a 
Christian  tradition  of  idea  and  conduct.  Of  this  tra- 
dition men  do  not  disown  the  precepts ;  they  only 
deny  the  parentage.  And  then  there  appears  some 
great  thinker,  some  really  venerable  man,  who  has 
learned  to  cherish  piety,  while  he  discards  dogma. 
The  next  order  of  operators  in  the  field  carry  the 
work  a  stage  farther,  and  cherish  morality,  while 
they  discard  piety.  And  the  anti-moral,  anti- 
spiritual  force,  that  is  strong  even  if  it  be  hidden 
in  us  all,  using  what  is  substantive  in  the  work  as 
a  cover  for  what  is  destructive,  looks  on  with  com- 
placency, and  swells  the  chorus  of  applause.     The 


CONCLUSION.  347 

skeptical  argument  is  in  reality  little  more  than  a 
graft,  set  into,  and  deriving  its  life  and  energy 
mainly  from,  a  tree  stronger  and  more  enduring 
than  itself. 

In  thus  stating  my  conviction,  that  it  is  the  great 
world-power  within  us  and  around  us  which  at  the 
present  time  gives  to  skepticism  the  chief  part  of 
its  breadth  and  its  impetus,  it  will  be  seen  that  my 
remarks  have  little  application  to  the  officers  or  the 
soldiers  of  the  army ;  to  those  who  really,  and  it 
may  be  laboriously,  think  out  subjects  admitted  to 
be  arduous  for  themselves.  They  apply  more  to 
the  camp-followers,  who  largely  outnumber  both, 
and  whose  voices  are  not  less  good  than  others 
to  swell  an  acclamation,  as  Falstaff' s  recruits  were 
not  less  good  than  others  to  fill  a  pit.  The  opin- 
ions of  a  man  are  due  partly  to  himself,  partly 
to  his  environment;  in  the  thinking  man  mainly 
to  himself,  though  even  he  may  be  affected  by 
latent  influences  never  consciously  present  to  his 
thoughts;  mainly,  sometimes  wholly,  to  environ- 
ment in  those  who  do  not  think  ;  and  environment, 


348  CONCLUSION. 

I  need  hardly  say,  includes  the  idols  and  the  fan- 
cies, the  shadows  and  the  phantoms,  of  the  pass- 
ing day. 

I  must,  however,  in  drawing  these  observations 
to  a  close,  for  a  moment  change  my  tone.  In  their 
nature  apologetic,  they  themselves  require  an  apol- 
ogy; and  an  apology,  too,  which  is  also  in  the 
nature  of  protest.  They  are  intended  to  meet,  so 
far  as  they  go,  a  state  of  things  peculiar  and  per- 
haps without  example,  in  which  multitudes  of  men 
call  into  question  the  foundations  of  our  reHgion 
and  the  prerogatives  of  our  sacred  books,  without 
any  reference  to  either  their  capacity  or  their  op- 
portunities for  so  grave  an  undertaking.  In  other 
matters,  qualification  must  be  known  or  shown ;  in 
religion,  it  is  taken  for  granted. 

We  have  to  bring  equally  into  view,  on  the  one 
side  and  on  the  other,  two  great  propositions.  On 
the  one  hand,  the  Christian  religion  stands  on  the 
foundation  of  free  and  intelligent  assent.  On  the 
other  hand,  every  man,  whatever  be  his  position, 
founds,  and  reasonably,  nay,  necessarily  founds,  the 


CONCLUSION,  349 

actions  and  experiences  of  his  life  principally  upon 
trust.  Upon  trust,  no  doubt,  which  is  both  intel- 
ligent and  free;  but  still  upon  trust.  Upon  trust, 
sometimes  in  particular  individuals,  sometimes 
upon  traditions  which  are,  in  a  narrower  or  wider 
sphere,  the  traditions  of  his  race.  Every  one  act- 
ing a  responsible  part  in  the  world,  be  it  great  or 
small,  and  be  it  acted  with  or  without  conscious- 
ness of  its  character,  is  continually  working  for 
others  as  well  as  for  himself;  is  establishing  and 
verifying  on  behalf  of  others,  and  in  lieu  of  others, 
intellectual  conclusions  or  material  facts,  which  are 
needful  for  hunian  life,  but  which  the  conditions  of 
human  life  do  not  permit  men  in  each  case  to  estab- 
lish and  verify  for  themselves.  Still,  to  establish  and 
verify  for  ourselves  is  best.  Independent  knowledge 
is  to  be  preferred  where,  and  as,  it  can  be  had.  The 
limiting  law  is  found  in  capacity  and  in  opportunity. 
Where  we  cannot,  and  this  is  often,  let  us  refuse  to 
seek  refuge  in  the  falsehood  of  a  pretended  or  sup- 
posed examination. 

But  it  seerns  to  be  beyond  doubt  that,  more  per- 


350  CONCLUSION. 

haps  in  these  days  than  of  old,  numbers  both  of 
women  and  of  men  question  the  rehgion  deHvered 
to  them  from  of  old  without,  or  in  excess  of,  both 
capacity  and  opportunity.  The  turn  and  training 
of  the  mind,  the  nature  of  callings  and  pursuits, 
make  it  for  some  of  us  reasonable  and  necessary 
to  put  the  great  historic  revelation  on  its  trial  as  to 
its  evidences  of  fact  and  doctrine,  and  its  relation 
to  the  character  and  condition  of  man.  This 
searching  process  is  in  itself  thoroughly  normal ; 
and  its  application  to  the  subject-matter,  and  the 
commonly  affirmative  results  of  such  application, 
through  so  many  ages  and  in  minds  so  many  and 
so  great,  have  continually  added  force  to  the 
authority  with  which  the  gospel  lays  claim  to  our 
assent  and  our  obedience. 

As  to  the  mass  of  mankind,  however,  reason 
teaches  that  the  presumption  is  for  each  man  in 
favor  of  that  which  he  has  received,  until  he  has 
found  solid  cause  to  question  it.  This  is  the  rule 
taught  by  common  sense,  and  established  in  com- 
mon life.     It  is  doubt,  and  not  belief,  of  the  things 


CONCLUSION,  351 

received,  which  ought  in  all  cases  to  be  put  upon 
its  defense,  and  to  sho>v  its  credentials  :  credentials, 
not  necessarily  in  terms  of  demonstration,  but  of 
rational  likelihood.  But  untested  doubt,  which 
often  makes  a  lodgment  in  our  minds,  is  a  tenant 
without  a  title,  a  dangerous  and  in  the  main  an 
unlawful  guest.  It  assumes  unawares,  and  in  de- 
fault of  examination,  the  attitude  of  demonstrated 
negation.  It  paralyzes  action ;  it  casts  into  the 
shade  the  sense  of  duty,  and  of  the  Divine  presence 
encompassing  us  in  all  our  ways ;  and  it  reduces 
the  pulse  of  our  moral  health.  Doubt  may  emanci- 
pate us.  Or  it  may  enslave  us.  But  it  must  be 
either  a  friend  or  an  enemy  :  it  cannot  be  a  neutral. 
And  those  doubts,  which  cannot  be  tested,  ought 
not  to  be  entertained  as  having  a  title  to  affect  con- 
duct or  belief.  And  such  inquiries  as,  from  being 
inadequate,  are  illusory,  are  but  fresh  forms  of  temp- 
tation from  the  path  of  duty.  Inquiry  should  be 
undertaken  as  a  solemn  duty,  when  it  can  be  made 
the  subject  of  effective  prosecution.  But  if  we  have 
not  the  means  of  effective  prosecution,  the  so-called 


352  CONCLUSION. 

inquiry  is  a  pretense  and  an  imposture ;  and,  under 
its  name,  we  become  the  mere  victims  of  assump- 
tions due  to  prejudice,  to  fashion,  to  propensity,  to 
appetite,  to  the  insidious  pressure  of  the  world- 
power,  to  temptation  in  every  one  of  its  Protean 
shapes.  The  universal  vocation  of  man  is  for  each 
to  regulate  his  own  proper  conduct  in  his  own 
proper  sphere.  A  noble  task  for  all,  but  even  this 
an  arduous  task ;  a  task  so  arduous,  that  none  can 
perform  it  in  perfection.  Duty  does  not  require  us 
to  arrive  at  conclusions  on 

"  Fixed  fate,  free-will,  foreknowledge  absolute," 

much  less  on  the  yet  deeper  and  darker  specula- 
tions which  lie  beyond,  and  which,  so  far  as  they 
are  formidable,  all  run  up  into  one  single,  one  per- 
haps impenetrable  problem,  the  presence  and  action 
of  evil  in  the  world.  The  Christian  faith  and  the 
Holy  Scriptures  arm  us  with  the  means  of  neutral- 
izing and  repelling  th'e  assaults  of  evil  in  and  from 
ourselves.  That  is  a  practical  answer.  Mist  may 
rest  upon  the  surrounding  landscape,  but  our  own 


CONCLUSION,  353 

path  is  visible  from  hour  to  hour,  from  day  to  day. 

"  I  do  not  ask  to  see 
The  distant  scene  ;  one  step  enough  for  me." 

Speculation,  which  is  purposeless,  becomes  irrev- 
erent ;  and  irreverent  speculation  on  the  doings 
and  designs  of  God,  by  those  who  believe  in  him, 
is  itself  a  sin.  To  leave  the  duty  of  governing  con- 
duct, to  which  every  one  of  us  is  called,  for  other 
functions  to  which  we  are  not  called,  unless  the 
power  of  following  them  reasonably  guarantees  our 
vocation  for  the  work,  is  morally  to  pass  from  food 
to  famine.  It  is  as  if  one  who  possesses  a  piece  or 
two  of  crockery  full  of  cracks,  should  announce 
that  he  desires  to  give  a  sumptuous  banquet  to 
the  neighborhood. 

But  besides  acknowledging  that  the  proper  pre- 
conditions of  legitimate  inquiry  are  adequate 
capacity  and  adequate  opportunity,  and  deploring 
the  course  of  those  who  treat  naked  and  unreasoned 
doubt  as  casting  a  burden  of  proof  upon  belief,  we 
must  bear  in  mind  that  religious  inquiry,  though  it 
may  raise  conflicting  issues,  is  not  like  a  suit  be- 


354  CONCLUSION. 

tween  parties  who  meet  upon  equal  terms,  or  the 
conflict  of  emperors  warring  for  a  territory  in  dis- 
pute. Our  Saviour  astonished  the  people  because, 
instead  of  being  lost  in  the  mazes  of  arbitrary  and 
vicious  excrescences  that  darkened  the  face  of  reli- 
gion, he  taught  them  "  with  authority,  and  not  as 
the  scribes."  Taught  them  with  authority,  that  is 
to  say,  with  the  title  to  command,  and  with  the 
force  of  command.  If  God  has  given  us  a  revela- 
tion of  his  will,  whether  in  the  laws  of  our  nature, 
or  in  a  kingdom  of  grace,  that  revelation  not  only 
illuminates,  but  binds.  Like  the  credentials  of  an 
earthly  ambassador,  it  is  just  and  necessary  that 
the  credentials  of  that  revelation  should  be  tested. 
But  if  it  be  found  genuine,  if  we  have  proofs  of  its 
being  genuine  equal  to  those  of  which,  in  the 
ordinary  concerns  of  life,  reason  acknowledges  the 
obligatory  character,  then  we  find  ourselves  to  be 
not  independent  beings  engaged  in  an  optional 
inquiry,  but  the  servants  of  a  Master,  the  pupils  of 
a  Teacher,  the  children  of  a  Father,  and  each  of  us 
already  bound  with  the  bonds  which  those  relations 


CONCLUSION.  355 

imply.  Then  head  and  knee  must  bow  before  the 
Eternal,  and  the  Divine  will  must  be  embraced  and 
followed  by  man  with  all  his  heart,  with  all  his  mind, 
with  all  his  soul,  and  with  all  his  strength. 

I  have  yet  one  more  closing  word.  I  have  desired 
to  make  this  humble  offering  at  the  shrine  of  Chris- 
tian belief  in  general,  and  have  sought  wholly  to 
avoid  the  questions  which  concern  this  or  that  par- 
ticular form  of  it.  For  there  is  a  common  cause  which 
warrants  and  requires  common  efforts.  Far  be  from 
me  the  intention  hereby  to  undervalue  particular 
beliefs.  I  have  not  intentionally  said  a  word  to  dis- 
parage any  of  them.  It  will  in  my  view  be  an  evil 
day,  and  a  day  of  calamity,  when  men  are  tempted, 
even  by  the  vision  of  a  holy  object,  to  abate,  in 
any  region  or  in  the  smallest  fraction,  the  authority 
of  conscience,  or  to  forget  that  the  supreme  title 
and  the  supreme  efficacy  of  truth  lie  in  its  integrity. 

NOTE   ON   THE   GADARENE   MIRACLE. 

The  miracle  of  the  possessed  Gadarene,  or  Ger- 
gesene,  raises  in  so  pointed  a  form  the  question  of 


356  CONCLUSION. 

demoniacal  possession  generally,  that  it  has  sup- 
plied the  central  point  in  the  discussion  of  the  case, 
and  that  other  points,  less  salient  on  the  surface, 
have  received  a  smaller  share  of  attention  than 
they  deserve. 

The  question  may  of  course  fairly  be  put, 
whether  the  movement  of  the  devils  by  permis- 
sion into  the  swine  involved  an  injustice  to  an 
innocent  owner,  which  would  not  be  at  all  in  har- 
mony with  the  usually  beneficent  character  of  our 
Lord's  ministry,  and  especially  of  his  miracles. 

Both  Bishop  Wordsworth^  in  his  Commentary 
and  Archbishop  Trench  refer  to  Josephus.  The 
Bishop  says,  "  Gadara  is  mentioned  by  Josephus 
as  a  Greek  city,  and  hence  the  swine."  I  am, 
however,  under  the  impression  that  both  these 
excellent  authors  may  have  insufficiently  examined 
the  effect  of  the  passages  in  Josephus,  which  relate 
to  the  subject.  These,  so  far  as  I  know,  are  three  in 
number,  and  are  found  in  the  '*  Antiq.  Jud.,"  XVII., 
13,  4,  and  the  "  De  Bello  Jud.,"  III.,  7,  I,  and  IV., 

^  In  loc,  and  Trench  on  the  Miracles,  p.  185. 


CONCLUSION.  357 

7,  3.  In  the  first-named  of  these,  Josephus  un- 
doubtedly says  that  Gadara  was,  like  Gaza  and 
Hippos,  a  Greek  city,  Hellenis  polls ;  but  he  ex- 
plains his  meaning  by  adding,  that  these  cities 
had  been  taken  by  the  Roman  authority  out  of 
the  Diocese  of  Jerusalem,  and  added  to  that  of 
Syria.  The  sense  seems  to  be  not  that  these  cities 
were  inhabited  by  a  Greek  population,  but  that 
they  had  politically  been  taken  out  of  Judaea  and 
added  to  Syria,  which  I  presume  was  classified  as 
simply  Hellenic,  a  portion  of  the  great  Greek  Em- 
pire erected  by  Alexander.  As  to  the  population 
of  Gadara,  the  passage  "  De  Bello  Jud.,"  Ill,  7,  i, 
appears  absolutely  to  prove  that  it  was  a  Jewish 
and  not  a  Greek  population ;  while  Josephus  also 
specifies,  in  "  De  Bello  Jud.,"  IV,,  7,  3,  that  many 
of  the  inhabitants  were  wealthy.  For  he  men- 
tions, in  III.,  7,  I,  that  when  Vespasian  took  the 
city  he  caused  all  the  adult  males  to  be  put  to 
death,  and  that  he  did  this  partly  on  account  of 
a  particular  misdeed,  but  partly  {mlsel  tou  ethnous) 
out  of  hatred  towards  the  nation  or  race,  evidently 


358  CONCLUSION, 

the  Jewish  nation,  not  possibly  the  Greek.  The 
testimony  of  Josephus,  therefore,  does  nothing  to 
cast  a  doubt  upon  the  natural,  and  in  the  absence 
of  counter-evidence  necessary,  supposition  that  our 
Lord  in  this  case  had  to  deal  with  Hebrews,  the 
ordinary  subjects  of  his  ministry,  bound  to  the 
law  of  Moses,  and  on  this  occasion,  as  it  would 
seem,  justly  punished  for  infringing  it. 

Hudson,  in  his  commentary  on  Josephus,  "  Antiq. 
Jud.,"  XVII.,  13,4,  gives  a  strong  opinion,  with  his 
reasons,  that  Gadara  is  a  wrong  reading,  and  that 
we  ought  to  read  Gerasa.  If  he  is  right,  the  pre- 
sumption founded  on  the  phrase  Hellenis  polls  at 
onge  disappears. 


Princeton  Theological  Sfmina,Li''Hri^^^ 


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